Pure Alchemy
by ketren
Summary: AU from end of original anime. No one expected Ed to return unscathed after he sacrificed himself to the Gate for his brother, but it's no surprise that he brings a host of problems with him when he does. It's a good thing Mustang and crew are used to helping clean up his messes.
1. The Great (if Unintentional) Escape

Hello, everyone! I'm ketren, and this is my first FMA fanfic. Please be gentle!

Let's get the business out of the way first, and then we'll begin!

**Title: **Pure Alchemy

**IMPORTANT/Please Read: **This story takes place at the end of the original anime, before the movie. However, I've changed some things:

(1) While Al has been restored to his body, he never lost his memory and he's his real age (which happens to be fifteen in this story).

(2) Roy didn't quit his job in the military.

(3) The Gate doesn't lead to Germany and our world.

**Summary: **AU. Gen. After sacrificing himself to get Al's body back, Ed finds himself imprisoned somewhere deep inside the realm of the Gate of Truth. The world in there may be strange, but Ed decides that he can deal with it as long as Al is safe…at least, until Ed is suddenly thrown back into Amestris in the midst of the same chaos that was once trapped inside the Gate. It may be nice to be back, but the Elrics and their military friends will have to clean up the mess—before it gets to them first.

**Rating: **This story is rated T mostly because of language. But let's face it, Ed has to let loose a few curses every now and then, because sometimes "oh, darn" doesn't really cut it.

**Disclaimer (once and for all): **Hiromu Arakawa, Square Enix, Viz Media, and a host of other companies have the rights to Fullmetal Alchemist. I am not making a profit off of this fanfiction.

And on with the show!

.

**.:One:.**

**The Great (if Unintentional) Escape**

.

Edward Elric was dying for what felt like the millionth time.

His entire body felt as though it was on fire, and every slight movement he made sent a shock of pain through him. The worst pain came from his torso, though—which probably had a lot to do with the fact that the Beast had slid its horn somewhere between Ed's ribs.

In retrospect, the entire incident was completely his fault; he hadn't really been paying attention to the territory and had strayed onto the Beast's turf. After that, it had been only a matter of time before the creature came to get rid of him in the only way it knew how. Caught by surprise, Ed had been unable to borrow alchemy, as he usually did, to chase the Beast away. And his automail arm had been no match for the creature's incredibly powerful horn.

He was having difficulty breathing now, and what little breath he had left was wasted cursing his own stupidity. _Thing's pretty fast for being so big…_Ed thought tiredly as colors swirled across his vision, though the colors may have had more to do with the changing atmosphere than anything else.

Ed's limbs—both flesh and metal—steadily grew limp; his head grew heavy and lolled back. The Beast was shifting, and a ripple of pain shot through him once more as it moved its head. Gradually, the horn slipped from his chest and he slid to his knees, finding barely enough strength to prop himself up.

"Shit," he murmured, blood leaking from his mouth, "not again." The fire in his chest grew stronger, and more painful, and it was spreading. He slumped over, eyes closing of their own accord, and the last of his breath leaked from his lips. As his heart stopped, the world grew dark and warm and wet, and he lay on the ground, motionless, until the familiar buzzing feeling brought him to life again.

.

Roy glanced at the door across from his desk for what felt like the millionth time. _Al is due in sometime today, _he thought to himself, staring at the knob as if expecting the boy—who looked so much like his brother now—to walk in as a result of that thought.

One year had passed since Ed and Al had journeyed to Lior to take on the sins. It had been one year since Al had ended up in the middle of Lior, in his body again for the first time in years, nearly unable to support himself without Rose's help. It had been one year since he had called Roy at East Headquarters, sobbing so hard that Roy could practically hear the phone rattle.

It had been one year since Fullmetal had disappeared.

Roy had been unable to believe it for the longest time. Fullmetal? Gone? It didn't seem as though that were even possible. Fullmetal, with his flashing golden eyes and hair, his cocky attitude, his cheeky grin. Fullmetal, with his stubborn pride, his devotion to Al that bordered on insanity, his knack for getting himself and his brother into all sorts of situations, and his knack for getting them out. Fullmetal, with his sensitivity to height comments, his fierce independence…gone? Not Ed.

And the strangest thing was that life went on. They were rewarded, all of them, for their "bravery, determination, and willpower." He had been promoted within a month to Brigadier General, Hawkeye to Captain, Havoc and Breda to First Lieutenants. He was surrounded by the same subordinates, Hawkeye still threatened to shoot him if he didn't finish paperwork, and they all fought over whose turn it was to make the coffee. Yet there was an absence, a gap, among his subordinates, and everyone could feel it. Ed was missing.

But _gone_? He couldn't be.

Al didn't seem to think so either. Within a week of his brother's disappearance, Al was in Roy's office begging to be allowed to somehow "borrow" Ed's right to research in the military library. Roy had been idly surprised at how willing the boy was to jump back into alchemy after what had happened, and how willing he was to be hurt again and to risk everything in an attempt to save his brother.

Of course, Roy had approved. Al had practically lived in the library back when Ed was around, and no one had ever stopped him then. Besides, the brass had turned a blind eye; after all, Al and Ed had exposed Bradley for a traitor—which was all the public knew about him—and many people in the country were still mourning the loss of the so-called "People's Alchemist." Keeping Al from such a "noble cause" was career suicide, not to mention that Roy didn't think he could have turned Al down after seeing the determined look on his face.

Al reported back to Roy diligently, stopping by whenever he had the chance (_How unlike Ed, _Roy would muse to himself), although rarely brought news and often just came to say hello. Perhaps he dropped by more out of habit than anything else. At any rate, there was apparently very little known about the Gate in the world of alchemical theory. Roy himself had only heard about it from the Elric brothers. From what little he understood, most of the information that Al had discovered regarding the Gate was more in the realm of myth than of actual science.

Roy had stopped hoping for good news whenever Al walked through the door. He wasn't one to give up quickly, but even Al's smiles were becoming few and far in between these days…

By this time, Roy had quite forgotten his paperwork. Some things never changed. Using his one good eye to peek back at the door, which was of course still closed, he hummed to himself and swiveled around in his chair. He looked out the window, where it was raining—wasn't it always?—and watched people run for cover in the streets below.

And he waited.

.

Something was poking him in the head. Ed's first instinct was to ignore it, because Al liked to wake him up at the freaking crack of dawn, but his fuzzy thoughts began to move at full speed. And then—

He sat up suddenly, his automail knife flashing at the Beast before him. For a moment, he froze as his brain caught up with his eyes, and he lowered his arm. This wasn't the same creature. Of course. The horned Beast, which was all fur, muscles, claws, and one really sharp horn, was nothing like the tiny thing that sat in front of Ed. Grinning.

Ed brushed his hand over his bare chest, feeling nothing to suggest that a horn had just nearly sliced his body in two. Dropping his arm, he glanced down at the creature. "Hey," he said warily.

"Warm," it responded almost immediately, stretching its black arms up to Ed's shoulders and pulling itself up to rest over his heart. It felt oily and slick against his skin, and Ed wished for the thousandth time that he hadn't removed his shirt before doing the alchemy for Al. If he'd known that it would mean spending eternity shirtless, he might have reconsidered his attire.

The creature had settled down, still grinning up at him toothily, and Ed heaved a sigh. He was back at the entrance to the Gate. This was where he ended up every time he died, every time the Gate brought him back to life.

The Gatekeepers—Ed's term for all of the little, black, watchful monsters that guarded the inside of the gate—were swarming around where Ed assumed the Gate itself was. He had never been close enough to tell for sure that it was there; the mass of Keepers was too dense. Each Keeper would fight viciously for space closer to the door. There was no way to tell for certain _why, _but they had probably observed the outside world for centuries, each fighting for a brief second at the door's entrance and rarely ever venturing far from the Gate. Something about their habits made Ed think that they were more curious than anything else.

A few times, Ed had tried to pass through the throng and find the Gate itself, but the Keepers had swarmed around him, boxing him in total darkness and pushing at him from all directions in their own attempts to reach the exit. Each time, Ed had become so turned around that he eventually found himself back where he started, bruised and out of breath.

Ed had not seen his own world since he had entered the Gate, however long ago that might have been.

Not that he was complaining, exactly. The Keepers' insatiable curiosity was probably what had saved his life in the first place.

After sacrificing himself—his mind, his body, his heart, his soul, everything, whatever he had left—in order to bring his brother back, Ed had found himself, startlingly whole, inside the Gate, being watched by what looked like thousands of eyes in the darkness. Following an initial panic attack, he had slowly realized that the Keepers weren't trying to kill him. In fact, they seemed rather infatuated. Trying to make use of their limited knowledge and vocabulary—which was apparently restricted to monosyllables—he had garnered the information that, not only were they the judges of equivalent exchange, but they were so curious about his world that they had taken him whole, regardless of equivalency.

Which meant, to Ed's immense annoyance, that equivalent exchange was not equivalent but subjective. All of the problems that he and Al had dealt with, thinking them "fair" and a result of a system of science, were the result of these creatures, whose curiosity had caused so much chaos…

Ed shook a little, and the Keeper on his chest felt it. "Cold?" it asked.

"No," Ed corrected absently, "Angry."

"Oh."

He saw, out of the corner of his eye, other Keepers near the back of the Gate looking at him interestedly, which usually meant that he was about to be covered in the searching, inquisitive creatures. The only way to prevent it, and to get the Keeper off of his chest, was to leave. He started walking away, and the little black creature that looked so much like a puppet shifted to stare at the Gate, which was becoming farther away. After a few moments, it hopped off, running toward the doors without as much as a backward glance.

Ed moved on.

Underfoot, the ground shifted from solid stone to soft grass; the air around him was full of wispy mist that floated about him slowly, clutching at his skin with finger-like tendrils. He heard thunder, or something like it, to his left, and the sky in that direction gradually became grey and cloudy. Ed headed right, walking quickly away from the storm until the world became dark and he could hardly see. The ground slowly changed once more, becoming hard and solid, and blue sparks in the air lit up like lightning bugs to light the way for him.

He had become used to this, these changes in the Gate. He had realized long ago that the world about him was composed of some sort of alchemy, though he had no idea how it worked despite having passed half an eternity here. The Beasts were made of alchemy as well, he thought; it had gotten to the point where Ed could sense when they were coming because he could feel the concentration of the alchemy in the air. It had been difficult at first. Edward was the type of person who liked to be in control of his surroundings, and this new world had confused him countless times. But given all the time in the world, a human could adapt to anything.

There was no need to sleep here, no need to eat or drink, no sense of time or direction, and he couldn't die. It was the most ironic, painful form of immortality anyone possibly could have been granted. The boredom was eating him alive.

The only thing that kept him going was the thought that he might eventually find a way out. He spent the majority of his time walking around the world in the Gate, but he had never come to any sort of end or boundary. He had attempted to get out of the doors, but the Keepers were too strong and too many for him to overcome.

And he was learning, too.

Flooding was no reason to panic. He didn't need to breathe. The only danger was that quick movements might alert the Angler or other water-Beasts.

Fires, earthquakes, windstorms, and other natural disasters were frightening but avoidable.

Time and gravity both played tricks on him at times.

Death meant nothing. All he had to do was wait out the pain and he would wake up back at the Gate as though he had never been touched.

Storms were to be avoided at all costs, unless he was in the mood for a rather painful death.

But he wasn't prepared for everything. He was still often caught by surprise; the alchemy around him would erupt into fire or a sudden earthquake, the air would change to some sort of gel or plasma, or, worst of all, he would find himself somehow trapped, unable to move or to do anything at all except wait for something to come and kill him. Life, if you could call it that, was interesting on this side of the Gate.

The blue sparks had multiplied, lining up as though creating a path for the boy who had once been known as the Fullmetal Alchemist. He walked slowly through the darkness, in no particular hurry. It was the worst when things quieted, as they had now. It was times like this that he began thinking about the past, and when his chest began to ache with a hunger to see a familiar place, time, or person.

It was times like this that he began to think about Al.

He worried that his brother hadn't made it. The Keepers weren't above taking Ed's body just for the hell of it, he knew. They would feel no remorse over not granting his wish once he was inside of the Gate. Had they at least given Al his soul and his armor back, if not his body? Had they done _anything_ to help him at all? And if they had given him life again, how was he? What was he doing, and was he alright? What had happened to the people he had known back in Amestris—to Winry and Pinako—to Mustang and Hawkeye and Havoc? How had Breda, Fuery, and Falman fared? He even wondered what had happened to Sensei and to Major Armstrong.

Not like he'd ever be able to answer any of his questions. This world was apparently infinite, and as far as Ed knew, there was no escape. The only thing he could take comfort in was that at least he had given Al a chance.

The lights danced around his ankles, and Ed began to feel the familiar shift of alchemy that signaled something different, a new atmosphere. The darkness became thicker, and darker, and then—

.

—he was standing and blinking in the sudden sunlight. _That was much faster than usual, _he thought to himself dispassionately. He shielded his eyes with his flesh hand, waiting patiently for them to adjust.

Ed squinted. This was a strange place—strange in that it was different from anything he had seen since he had been pulled into the Gate. It looked very much like a city.

And there were people.

Ed blinked, mind racing. There were _people. _In the _Gate. _

Slowly, he became aware of an ache in his chest, a sudden hollowness as though something had been removed from his very being. Keeping an eye on the people who bustled past him—ordinary people! As if this were an ordinary city!—he rolled his thoughts around carefully to figure out what was wrong, what was different. And it struck him in a rush that nearly took his breath away.

He couldn't feel alchemy. Nothing.

There was no alchemy here. Which meant—?

Setting off with a sudden burst of energy, he ran down the street, glancing left and right in search of—what, some explanation? He didn't understand.

It was all so _normal_. It was all he remembered from his world. Little things, like a stained glass window, pigeons crying from phone lines, empty boxes in a trash can, kittens in an alleyway—kittens for Al—laughter and yelling, explosions of color and flowers, the smell of spices and shouts from street vendors selling glittering necklaces, a young couple holding hands, fresh cotton candy, maps and the sound of water…there were old men playing cards on a table in an outdoor café, windows with pots of herbs, the smell of fresh bread and cigarette smoke. Everything was here. Everything.

He stumbled to the end of the street, which was sectioned off by a fence. There was water on the other side.

_Water. _

He was on the edge of a lake, and there were boats, boats with people with smiles, questions, and clicking cameras.

_Tourists._

_I know where this is, _he thought. _I know where I am._

It took a moment to gather his thoughts, for it to really hit him. When it finally did, he sank to his knees, grasping the fence for support.

_Aquaroya. I'm in Aquaroya. I'm home._

.

.

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**A/N: **This is probably one of the most bizarre stories I have ever written. The randomness is probably because most of the story is part-dream, part-rabid plot bunny, and partially inspired by Miyazaki movies. Just don't try to rationalize it too much. :)

I don't know why, but when I first started the series, I was under the impression that there was this vastly cool world beyond the Gate with all sorts of creatures besides the little black Gatekeepers, and that one day all would be revealed…but it wasn't. It was just Germany. No offense, Germans. It's just that you're not exactly in an alternate universe. Anyway, I'm fixing that, for me.

If you can, please drop me a review! Let me know what you liked, what you didn't like, what could use improving. Even just one word would make me insanely happy.

Thank you for reading!

~ket

**Next Chapter: **Horrible Beasts and Other Fun Developments


	2. Horrible Beasts and Other Fun

**.:Two:.**

**Horrible Beasts and Other Fun Developments**

.

So many emotions swarmed around in Ed's mind that he hardly knew what to do. He was relieved, excited, nervous, thrilled, weary…the familiar sensation of the breeze from the lake that sailed across his skin distracted him; it was so different and so much more _real_ than anything in the Gate had felt. His mind began to race, coming to focus on the person who mattered most in the world.

He slowly pushed himself to his feet, legs shaking slightly, and found that there was a stupid grin on his face he couldn't quite wipe off. The ground was solid beneath him.

Even after a moment, it was still solid.

No vague threats in the distance, no shifts in the air, and time flowed steadily. Around him were only steel and cement and plaster, with bricked walls topped by black-shingled roofs. As far as he could see, there were no improbable creatures in the general vicinity, and the only invisible thing here was the light sea breeze. Instead of gatekeepers to cling to him or barrage him with one-word questions, there were only people pushing past him on their way elsewhere in the world.

Throwing his head back, he gazed at the sky above him. It was a calm and cloudless blue, just as it had always been in his vague memories of hazy Risembool summers. After a minute, he began to chuckle to himself and then, gradually, to laugh aloud. This was insane, wasn't it? Was _he _insane? The warm sunlight on his face made him quiet down, and he was rapidly overwhelmed by the feeling of comfort, of home.

In fact, he probably would have stood there for longer if not for a slight prickling on the back of his neck and the vague notion that something was wrong.

Following his instincts had saved his life on more than one occasion, but this time might have been more than instinct. Most people hadn't noticed the odd darkness in the water, but Ed _felt _it. The same wild feeling of alchemy that had surrounded him in the Gate was now emanating from somewhere below, where the cement supports for the city walkways slithered down into the deep green water.

He gaped over the railing, leaning forward to study the rippling canal water that faded to black just a few yards away, and then the blackness briefly pierced the surface of the water in something that looked like a dark and shimmering shell. Ed's stomach plummeted as he got a better look. What little sunlight filtered through the dark water showed him that there was no mistaking the shiny, armored body, the red-brown eyes that flickered about as though searching for something, the strong, wide tail…there was no mistaking it at all.

It was an Angler, just like the one in the Gate. There were only a few words Ed could think of to properly sum up the situation, and he used them all, spitting the profanities into the air.

He drew himself up, only faintly aware that the Beast was beginning to gain the attention of a few crowds of tourists. _How the hell is this possible…? _He thought to himself. If the Angler was here, then he—Ed—must still be in the Gate…but then where was all of the alchemy? The familiar buzzing of the alchemy that had surrounded him at all times was now completely absent—_which can only mean that I've left the Gate…right? _

People were still brushing past him even as he leaned over the railing. These _were _real people, weren't they? Real people, who were living and dying outside of the Gate, and who were beginning to notice the odd black shape in the water.

The Beast was nervous, Ed noticed abruptly, and it had abandoned its normal silent glide for jerky, stilted movements. It was almost too large for the canal, and it was walled in closely on both sides, as this was where the waterway ran to meet the lake a little farther on…

It was probably scared as hell, Ed realized. And a scared and cornered Beast was the worst kind.

"What _is _that?" someone murmured from somewhere over Ed's shoulder. People were beginning to crowd in for a closer look, hugging the sides of the railings and pressing closer to see whatever was drawing attention down below. The Angler wriggled its large, dark tail, splashing water aside and diving below the surface. A freckled woman balancing a little girl on her shoulders was opening and closing her mouth like a fish.

Ed waited for it.

She screamed.

"A sea monster!" someone cried. It didn't take long for the panic to spread; half of the crowd began hurrying away and shouting, gathering up their children and bags, and crashing into each other in their haste to leave. The rest pushed in more closely, craning their necks to catch a glimpse of what surely couldn't be a _monster. _

"Get out of here," Ed muttered to the few people who had the guts—or the stupidity—to stick around and peer into the river, "I have the feeling this is gonna get messy."

Questions aside, he was in his element now. Worries and doubts flew out of his mind as he concentrated on the situation at hand with a practiced ease: _this_ was something he could do. Whether he was inside the gate or out of it, dangerous situations suited him just fine.

The voice in his head that sounded like Al politely reminded him that this particular Beast had killed him in the Gate a few more times than he'd like to admit, and if he _had _truly escaped from the Gate, then this was the only life he had left. _And I still need it_, he added.

Ed hesitated, but not for long. He began to walk along the side of the river, following the Beast's twisting path in the water, weaving in and out of the people who were stupid enough (he was now reasonably certain that it was just stupidity) to remain. Considering that the creature had not yet attacked and had done nothing but zigzag back and forth, however, perhaps the bystanders were beginning to think it was docile.

Not everyone thought it was harmless, apparently. Ed's eyes fell upon a few fishermen farther down the way who had gathered near the middle of a bridge over the water. Several had come bearing rifles or harpoons, and were now shouting orders to each other and taking aim.

"_Don't—_" he shouted, but it was too late.

They fired at the Beast, spurred on by a few cheers from the crowd; the ensuing splashes in the murky water made it difficult to see anything at all, and the onlookers seemed to hold their breath as one as they waited to see what had happened. The water settled, and the fishermen looked triumphant for several moments ("Idiots," Ed said, "they've just made it mad…") until the Beast roared out of the river, sending sprays of water everywhere as it catapulted itself toward the bridge, cracking the supports.

Ed instinctively clapped his hands together, his thoughts wheeling about his mind before he quickly settled on one, and slapped them onto the pavement.

Nothing happened.

He froze. Again, he clapped his hands, slamming his hands down harder.

No change.

No alchemy.

He couldn't quite process the absence of the alchemy that had surrounded him completely from the moment he had been lost in the Gate, and he only distantly heard the creaking of the bridge and the screams of the frightened crowd. Alchemy was _gone, _he realized; he couldn't feel any alchemy anywhere at all…except from the Beast.

He stood and hung over the railing to see the broken bridge, which was crumbling slowly into the water. The few visible fishermen were dangling from the edge and clinging to the wood in desperation. Alchemy or no, there wasn't much time.

Ed was a genius with more than just alchemy, though, and presently his mind whirled through what he knew of Aquaroya: the city's layout, the waterways and bridges, the military and weaponry used, the structure of the buildings, the docks and inspection areas, the pound locks—

—_the locks_.

All at once, everything snapped into place. A few precious moments were spent in an attempt to work out the details and the geography, and then he was off, sprinting as fast as his feet would carry him.

"Find an alchemist!" someone roared from behind him. "We have to get that bridge back up!"

Ed stopped suddenly, turning to see an ash-haired man in a military uniform—a Major, by the shoulder stripes—running along the railing and ordering a few privates and sergeants around. _Finally, someone up there is looking after me, _he thought, doubling back.

"Alchemy isn't working," Ed called hurriedly as he approached. The man spun around, a look of annoyance sweeping over his face as he took in the teen before him.

"Look, kid, we don't have time for this."

"I'm a state alchemist," he said, automatically reaching into his pants pocket, "I—" He stopped short, feeling around and finding nothing. His watch was gone. He realized what he must look like—a wild, shirtless kid claiming to be a state alchemist—and grinned sheepishly at the Major. "Look, you're just gonna have to trust me on this."

The man was not amused. "Get back. Civilians need to be out of the way." He turned his back, nodding as a private relayed information. Ed growled in frustration.

"Hey, I just need a boat. A fast one. If we—"

"I thought I told you to get back."

"But—"

"Don't worry, we can take it from here, kid."

"Just _listen,_" he snarled. "I can't believe you're…"

He trailed off as the man moved away, shouting orders at the nearest officers, who readied their harpoons.

"Don't _fire_ at it, you idiots!" Ed shouted, and some of the men glanced his way in surprise. "Its shell is too thick, you'll just—"

"Look, you little brat," the Major said suddenly, unable to ignore Ed any longer, "If you don't get out of here in the next three seconds, I'll have you arrested."

"You _bastard_—"

But the Major was distracted once more, this time hurrying to berate a man who was fumbling his gun at the railing. In the meantime, the Angler had become furious, and it was only a matter of time before it began thrashing and trying to destroy the walkways and walls.

Ed ran a hand through his hair, letting out a frustrated breath as he gathered his thoughts. He'd forgotten how useful that damn watch was. It was annoying being treated like a kid when you needed it least. How was he supposed to work things out if no one listened to him?

"I got a boat," said a voice from behind him.

Spinning smartly on his heel, Ed came face to face with a small, freckled boy—maybe ten or eleven years old—with dark brown eyes and hair, a strong chin, and a look of determination on his face. Beside him was a smaller boy with similar features who bit his lip in worry.

Ed softened immediately. "I need a fast boat." he clarified, already beginning to move away.

"I got a speedboat. Fastest in the city."

Ed stopped. "Can you drive it?"

The kid grinned at him. "I'm practically professional."

The alchemist hesitated. "Look, kid, I don't think you know what you're getting into. If things go wrong—"

"Hey, from the looks of it, it's not like you got a lotta other choices."

Ed slowly let out a breath of air, acutely aware of the screams, shouted orders, and the sound of splashes coming from behind him. "Yeah, I guess I don't."

"Long as you make sure not to wreck my boat, I'll help."

"I'll do my best," Ed said. The boy grimaced but shrugged. Turning quickly to the younger boy, he added, "I'll need you, too, though," Ed continued, "but for a different reason. I need you to go talk to the workers at the locks. How fast can you run?"

The younger boy grinned suddenly as well, almost a mirror of his older brother, and Ed was suddenly and painfully reminded of Al.

"How fast do you need me to get there?"

.

"I'm still not sure about this," Ed yelled over the wind to the boy—Anthony, as he had introduced himself—as the boat sped upriver. It had taken them a few minutes, at a sprint, to reach the boat's dock. The boat turned out to be quite small, about the size of an average automobile. This, as Anthony explained as he started it up, was quite helpful in allowing it to reach high speeds. There was a rather large motor, at least relation to the size of the boat, that Ed had watched him start with no small degree of curiosity.

Anthony had been right. The boat was quite fast—fast enough, Ed hoped—and the kid himself was a natural with the controls. "Don't worry," the boy shouted back, "my dad built this boat from scratch, outta only the best stuff. And I've gotten her through every storm that's ever come our way. Whatever that is isn't going to take us out."

_I hope you're right, _Ed said, momentarily dwelling on the futility of this mission: he, armed with only a harpoon gun he'd managed to swipe from the military officers and absolutely no alchemy whatsoever, was endangering a child's life by allowing said child to pilot a handmade boat which may or may not be faster than the Beast that was to chase them, and they were basing the entirety of the situation in the hope that an even younger kid had managed to convince the canal lock workers downstream to cooperate with an impossible plan. Could things get any worse?

_Don't ask that, _Ed chided himself, _or else they will. Besides, things _have_ been worse…_

The two of them tensed abruptly as they rounded a bend, catching sight of the broken bridge. "Slow down," Ed yelled. "We need to see where it is."

The engine quieted and spluttered as they slowed down, both of them peering over the sides of the boat to see. The Beast was either absent or adept at hiding, not that it was difficult to hide in the murky depths of the grimy canal water, and someone must have had the sense to have the few other vessels clear the water.

"Turn the boat around. Just in case. And kill the engine."

Anthony followed his instructions wordlessly. The only sounds they heard were footsteps, distant voices, and the water lapping against the sides of the buildings.

"You! Down there!"

Their heads jerked up at the sudden shout. Ed groaned at the sight of the ashen-haired major, surrounded by many gun-wielding officers. There was a fair amount of civilians on the other side of the river who were watching with interest.

"Get the hell out of the water!" The Major ranted. "That _thing_ is still down there, and it can repel bullets; even _we _can't—"

"I know_._ Don't worry," Ed grinned up at him, deliberately using the Major's own words, "_we_ can take it from here."

"You little—!"

Ed ignored him after that, because he _felt _the Beast swim closer from somewhere just ahead of the boat. The absence of alchemy in the air around him made the alchemy inside of the Angler strikingly clear by contrast. "There," he murmured to Anthony, who tensed and peered in the direction that Ed pointed.

Even the idiotic Major shut up.

The Beast was swimming close to the wall; they could see its dark, shimmering skin below the water, a deep black point in the murky green. Its eyes were flashing as it watched the boat above it.

"Get ready," he ordered, and Anthony powered up the engine again, maneuvering the boat while watching the creature carefully out of the corner of his eye.

Ed looked over the side of the boat very slowly, making sure to keep the majority of his weight on the other side of the craft. He was intensely aware of the Beast's position, of its powerful tail and the way the water rolled as it lazily floated past. The crowd was quiet and tense as Ed moved, gazing over the railings in wonder.

But Ed had stopped. The Beast moved slowly around the boat as if to get a closer look, and it finally caught sight of him. With a wry grin, Ed shielded his eyes from the sun and waved, watching the beast through his own dim reflection in the water. "Hey, there, old buddy."

Its eyes locked in recognition, and they flickered with anger. Ed had never understood why the Beast chased him whenever it could, but this was the first time that the trait would—he hoped—work to his advantage. "Go," he yelled to Anthony as he braced himself, and the boat shot off as though Anthony believed the devil itself was after them, which may have been close enough to the truth.

The splash that the boat made must have temporarily confused the Angler, because Ed could feel it getting farther away. For a moment, he began to think that his idea hadn't worked (perhaps the Beast liked killing him less than he thought it did) but his doubts were assuaged when the Beast rushed out of the water, pulling his head from beneath the spray enough for Ed to see its rows of familiar sharp teeth.

The canal flowed in a relatively straight path toward the lake, filtering off into lesser streams here and there, but Anthony ignored them, as they were far too small for the Angler to fit through, and their destination was along the main channel. The wind whipped through Ed's hair as the boat parted the water, marking their path with foaming trails.

Ed kept an eye on the Beast, thankful that the boat was as fast as Anthony had said it was. They were getting farther and farther away from the creature, and Ed began to feel the confidence he usually felt just before things began to go wrong.

And of course they did.

A flicker of alchemy and a giant jet of water spouted suddenly from the river just in front of the boat; Anthony swerved and only narrowly avoided missing it. The boat rammed into the wall, and Ed barely managed to keep from being thrown from the boat, though his flesh shoulder cracked painfully against the cement. Quickly checking the engine and redirecting the boat, Anthony put them back on course, coaxing all the speed he possibly could out of the little boat to make up for the few seconds lost time.

"What was _that?_" he shouted over the howl of the engine, shooting a worried glance at Ed. The alchemist was silent for a moment, staring into the water behind them in dismay.

"Looks like…_we _can't do alchemy, but _it _can."

"You didn't mention that," the kid said, sounding annoyed

"I didn't _know_ that," Ed said testily.

Anthony was quiet for a moment, watching the water before him. "Okay, hang on. We're almost there."

The water began to roar behind them; Ed turned his head to see what looked like a miniature tidal wave that was rising from just above the dark shape in the water. Or at least, it was miniature at first, but it grew steadily, and within a minute it was higher than the top of Ed's head.

"Anthony," Ed said faintly, "how close are we to the locks?"

"I can see them!" Anthony shouted suddenly, and Ed spun around to see the metal gates glistening in the sunlight in the distance. He could have shouted with joy.

"Can't this thing go any faster?"

"It's at full speed!"

There was a commotion at the locks, which Ed could only take it as a sign that someone, somewhere, was listening to Anthony's brother. The closer they got, the louder the noise became: there were crowds of people waiting around and leaning over the sides of the river; Ed could only hope that someone was manning the gates. As he watched, the first silver structure began to open slowly, granting them passage. Ed grinned; at least something was going right.

He turned to face the Angler, grabbing the harpoon gun that he had swiped from the military officers. He settled it like a rifle in his arms. It dawned upon him that this was the first time he'd have to use a gun outside of the shooting range, the first time his ability to hit a target might mean the difference between life and death. _Guess I'll have to thank Havoc when this is all over, _he thought distractedly to himself as he aimed. The boat slowed as they approached the second wall of the lock, and the Beast—and wave—steadily caught up.

"Almost…" Anthony said as Ed fingered the trigger. "Okay…_go!_"

Ed fired the harpoon; a split second later, Anthony twisted the boat to avoid hitting the back wall of the lock. The wave crashed down upon them an instant later, capsizing the small craft and sending both Ed and Anthony flying into the water.

Struggling in the murky river water, Ed moved his heavy limbs as quickly as he could, regretting that he had never learned to do much more than keep his head above water and dog-paddle. He finally broke the surface, gasping the fresh air and shaking the water from his eyes to see Anthony before him, wide-eyed but unhurt. Both of them immediately swam as close as they possibly could to the closed lock wall; the first wall was slowly closing farther away.

"Did you get it—?" Anthony gasped as they swam for a nearby ladder.

"Think so. I'm not usually the best shot, but even _I _wouldn't have missed something _that _big. _Hurry._" Ed was suddenly aware of the Beast again; the harpoon wouldn't keep it for long. A splash alerted him to the Beast's sudden movement.

Quickly closing the distance between himself and the ladder, he grabbed at the slippery metal rungs and clumsily hoisted Anthony over his injured shoulder, ignoring the fiery throbs as he climbed faster than he had thought possible. A strangled cry from Anthony made him move faster, finally shoving the boy forward and into the outstretched arms of the crowd. He hoisted himself up the last few rungs, pausing at the top to peer down at the beast that stared furiously up at him, the remnants of its damaged tail swaying behind it. The harpoon had slowed it down, at least, and though Ed had actually intended to pin one of the creature's appendages to the ground, he couldn't argue much with the way things had turned out.

The crowd was yelling and shouting at an earsplitting volume, but Ed didn't care. He let out his breath, suddenly too bone-weary to clamber up the last two or three rungs, and too content to stay where the sun and warm breeze could play on his skin again. He shot a lazy grin at Anthony, who sat up on the ground with his legs dangling onto the top rung. "Not bad, kid."

The boy's face split into a grin of his own, but he looked down and winced as a sudden crack came from below.

Ed glanced over his shoulder. "Looks like I owe you a new boat."

"I'll hold you to that," Anthony said with a slight grimace.

"But come on, wasn't it worth it to say you took on a _real _sea monster?" Ed asked, earning a tired laugh.

There was a loud shout, and Anthony nearly tumbled forward as his brother wrapped him in a tight hug, then dragged him back and away from the ladder.

Ed chuckled wearily at the display, and as the brothers disappeared, a few hands stretched forward in Ed's general direction—he knew he must look like a tired, drenched mess—and Ed reached for one gratefully.

Only to feel cold metal slip around his wrist. He jolted, scowling at the man above him.

"You were warned," said the ashen-haired Major, "and now you're under arrest."

.

.

.

**A/N: **Oh no! A dose of déjà vu there at the end…also, a few quick things, in case you're interested:

**Anglers: **The Angler is named for the real-life Anglerfish, which has so many teeth that it scares the hell out of me. The Anglers in this story are just giant fish with lean bodies and longer tails than Anglerfish, though they have just as many teeth. The teeth are very important.

**Locks: **For those of you who don't know what water locks are (I never knew what they were called before I looked it up when I wrote this), I basically just used them in this story as a chamber in the water composed of two gates that can open and close. If you're curious to know what they're really used for it might be helpful to check out Wikipedia, from which you can learn the basic idea of locks in a minute or less (guaranteed!…or you might end up in a thirty-minute Wikipedian loop).

**Ed's marksmanship: **You didn't read wrong—Ed can shoot a gun! This story is in the same universe as a one-shot I'll be posting in which Havoc finds himself teaching Ed to shoot. It's not at all necessary to read it in order to understand this story, but it will vaguely explain Havoc and Ed's friendship in this fic.

Thanks again to everyone who reviewed last chapter! Especially for the anonymous reviewers, since I can't pm you guys to thank you. Please let me know what you thought of this chapter!

~ket

**Next Chapter: **A Warm Welcome (Why Is No One Surprised?)


	3. A Warm Welcome (Why is No One Surprised)

**.:Three:.**

**A Warm Welcome (Why Is No One Surprised?)**

.

Edward Elric was extremely happy.

He had one arm handcuffed to a chair in a claustrophobic interrogation room in Aquaroya, and he had been left alone in the room for approximately an hour. He was still shirtless and what little clothes he did have were soaking wet; as a consequence, he was freezing cold except where the warm pain throbbed up and down his bruised shoulder (for which he had been given no medical treatment). The whole situation reminded him of the last time he'd been here in the city, arrested by that local detective instead of the military, of course, but still generally mistrusted and rudely detained. He had no idea what he was going to tell his interrogators when they entered the room, but for the moment, his stomach was rumbling in protest, and he was extremely groggy.

During his time in the Gate, he'd had no need for food or rest, and he was wearily pleased by the return of these unfamiliar needs, however annoying. Additionally, he'd just helped to capture a huge sea monster without being killed, and it was going to take a lot to bring him down from that particular high.

He hummed a little, looking around the drab, dimly-lit room. There was a table before him with two chairs facing his way, and although he knew that the chairs would likely be filled soon enough, it did little to diminish his contentment. Ed looked up to see a face staring at him through the small and grimy window in the concrete door behind the table. When he realized who it was, he smirked and stuck out his tongue—immature, yes, but he couldn't really help himself—and watched as the face in the window reddened in anger.

The door flew open and the ashen-haired Major stormed in, trailed by a young orange-haired man, a First Lieutenant, who fidgeted uncomfortably. The Major leaned with both hands on the table, breathing heavily as though slamming the door had been a strenuous activity.

"Can I help you?" Ed asked coolly.

The Major was silent for a moment, looking at Ed in anger, before he straightened and took a deep breath. "You captured that—that _thing_. And you seemed to have a great deal of knowledge about it—"

"I just happened to be lucky," Ed said, feigning modesty.

"—like how hard it's outer shell was, where to shoot the harpoon at the tail—"

"Really? You arrested me because I have eyes and common sense?" He asked sarcastically.

"_Also, _it chased _you, _though it had been so busy attacking the walls that it ignored most of the people who fell in the water. It was familiar with _you—_"

"Like that's _my _fault! _I_ can't help being the most attractive person in Aquaroya—"

"—and your plan was utterly _ridiculous! _Endangering the life of a young boy by forcing him to man a boat almost into a solid wall—"

"Are you sure this whole interrogation thing isn't just because my 'ridiculous' plan got the Beast and you couldn't?"

The Major thumped his fist against the table. "Now, _listen, _you—!"

"—Sir?" the Lieutenant broke into the conversation uneasily. "Maybe it would be for the best if we did this as quickly as possible? It's just…"

With a visible effort, the Major calmed himself down. Ed knew that this was the part where the questions started coming, and he knew that he couldn't answer them. If anyone found out about the absurdity of his situation, there would be no telling what could happen; being the only person to see and return from the other side of the gate would make him a bug under a magnifying glass for just about every alchemist in Amestris. Ed exhaled slowly as the Major spat out his first question.

"What's your name?" Well, that was easy enough.

"Edward Elric."

"Elric?"

"As in 'Edward Elric, Fullmetal Alchemist.'"

The man snorted.

"Seriously. Look, it sounds weird, but just…get Colonel Mustang on the phone. He'll know it's me."

"You'll have to do better than that. The Fullmetal Alchemist is dead—"

"Obviously not."

"—and I'm sure he didn't look like a sniveling little brat."

"_WHO _ARE YOU CALLING SO _LITTLE _THAT AN _ANT _COULD_—_"

"How old are you?"

Edward deflated in mid-rant, stumped by the question. "Uh, fifteen?" He felt like he was fifteen, but there was no telling how long it had been since he had entered the Gate. "How long has it been since—"

"I'll ask the questions," the Major said as Ed glared at him sullenly. "Are you familiar with that monster?"

"_May_be."

"Is that a 'yes'?"

"No, it was a 'maybe.' I can see where it would be hard for you to understand."

"Are you—?"

"Yes, I'm insulting you."

A growl. The Major's face was alarmingly red. "Why did the monster follow you?"

"Maybe it just likes me a lot."

"Could you give a definitive answer?"

"No."

The Major rolled his shoulders back as though restraining himself from strangling Ed. "Are you familiar with these monsters?"

"Maybe."

"Should I assume that 'maybe' means 'yes'?"

"Don't I have the right to remain silent?"

"Well, yes, but—"

"I hereby invoke my right to remain silent."

"Answer the question."

Ed raised his eyebrows and mimed zipping his mouth closed.

"Kid, _answer the_—"

"—Sir?" The Lieutenant interrupted again, wincing nervously as the Major whirled around. "Maybe you ought to just…call in the brass. That…creature is probably something they need to be informed of anyway, and I'm sure they could find a way to get him to talk."

The door opened suddenly to reveal a worried-looking private. "Sir? There are over a hundred civilians outside protesting—" his eyes flickered to Ed and back. "Well. Any more show up, it'll be a security risk. What should we do?"

The Major's hand flew to his forehead, and trailed down his face to rub at his chin. The room was silent for a moment as the man glared at Ed, who only offered a smirk. _Protesters, huh? I guess people usually don't like it when you arrest the guy who saved the day._

The Major sighed suddenly and addressed the redheaded lieutenant. "Brennans. Call this in. Tell them about the creature, and that we have a kid here that knows about the situation but is resisting interrogation anyway. Randall, there isn't much we can do. Let them protest; we should have the kid out of here in a few hours anyway." The men hurried off, and the door banged shut. The Major turned to Ed, fixing him with a piercing stare. "Don't suppose you'd change your mind?" the man asked, almost tiredly.

The alchemist pressed his lips firmly together.

.

Roy Mustang was extremely irritated.

For nearly three hours this morning, his office had been running perfectly. It had been silent, and everyone was finishing paperwork (well, Havoc and Breda had been goofing off, but they were doing it _silently, _and that was what counted). He had been looking forward to finishing what little he had left to do and taking the rest of the day off when the calls started coming in.

And it wasn't even calls that he was particularly used to. At one point, he had nearly started making up answers just so he'd have something helpful to say.

Apparently, there were monsters. All over Amestris. And as far as he could tell, there were even reports of the things in other countries as well.

The majority of the creatures seemed harmless, from what he could make out over the phone. Some of them just stood there looking around bewilderedly, others chased animals and small children but were doing no real harm, and others ran around stealing things from people's houses. It was like a strange dream that wouldn't end.

Mustang was suddenly pulled from his thoughts when he heard a shout come from the other room. He thrust his hands into his gloves out of habit and raced inside to find that everyone in the small office had raised their guns to a black _thing_ on Breda's desk. The window had been broken, and the dark creature—Mustang assumed that it was the reason the window was shattered—was staring back at them with wide eyes and the creepiest grin Mustang had ever seen.

"What the hell…" the words seemed to have escaped from Havoc's mouth before the man realized it.

"What should we do, sir?" Hawkeye asked sensibly.

"Don't shoot it unless it's threatening someone's safety," Mustang said. "It seems the little black ones are relatively harmless. Just try to get it back out through the window without touching it. Fuery, run downstairs again and see if Al's called in and we missed him with all of the other calls. I have the feeling we'll need his help with all of this sooner than we thought."

Fuery rushed out and Havoc disappeared into the next room as the little monster picked up some of Breda's paperwork. "Fun," it said, startling everyone in the office. "Leaves?" it asked, throwing the papers into the air. They kept their weapons trained on the black blob behind the falling white pages. The little grinning creature let out a laugh that sounded like a short bark before grabbing another stack of papers and beginning to shred them. "Pieces," the thing said as Breda gave a dismayed cry.

"Do it fast," the redhead said gruffly as Havoc came back with a broom. Without losing his grip on his cigarette, the First Lieutenant quickly swept the little monster onto the broom and thrust it out the window. There was a startled cry as the thing fell to the ground, but when Havoc and Mustang poked their heads outside, it had already picked itself up off of the ground and begun slinking away.

"Great. It's nice to know they can survive five-story falls," Havoc said sarcastically.

The phone rang again, startling all four of them. "Get something to put over the window, and then get back to work," Mustang said tiredly as Falman picked up the phone.

The Brigadier-General went back to his office as his own phone began to ring again, and he thought privately that they had been lucky it was just a _small _creature.

It was the destructive ones that threw Mustang off guard. What was he supposed to do about the creatures that attacked buildings or homes? And what about the sudden earthquakes, hurricanes, and tornadoes? The firestorms that had ravaged half the countryside? At first, they had begun evacuations, but there was nowhere truly safe for people to run. Then he had offered backup from Central, sending out men to different locations, but there were so many reports coming in that there were no additional men left. Their forces were spreading thinner, and the calls were still coming.

And the fact that, apparently, no one in the world could use alchemy at the moment made things even worse.

All Mustang could really do about _that _problem was send help or have the call wired to one of his superiors for further instructions. Though he was an expert in fire alchemy, he could freely admit that he was fairly useless when it came to something like this.

He picked up the phone and began to answer the same questions everyone had been asking. Where were the monsters from? Why couldn't anyone do alchemy? What could they do about the attacks and thievery? Did shooting them work?

What he really needed was to record his own voice saying "I don't know" to be played back whenever people phoned. He eventually wired the call through to his superiors—_Let _them _deal with this one, _he thought maliciously—when Falman poked his head in.

"Brigadier-General? Al is here."

"_Finally,_" Mustang said exasperatedly, rushing through the door to find Al standing before him, silent and grim. He smiled at Mustang in his usual serene way and Mustang leaned against the wall, letting out a smirk. For the first time, he felt like things might start going their way. There were few people in the world whose competence Mustang was assured and rather proud of, and Alphonse Elric was one of them. Mustang noted absently that Alphonse held in his hand a library book, and though he nodded to the other members of the office, his thoughts were elsewhere.

"Do _you_ have any idea what's going on?" Mustang asked hopefully.

Al sighed, seemingly aware that all eyes in the office were on him, despite the ringing phones and distant sounds of chaos that could be heard from the hall behind him. "I might. Nothing like this has ever happened before, so I'm really just making an educated guess."

"We've just been making most of this up as we go, Al," Breda said, "so I'm sure it's better than anything we've got so far."

"Okay. I think there's something wrong with the Gate," Al said bluntly.

There was a tense pause.

"Wrong? Wrong how?" Hawkeye said. None of them had more than a basic understanding of the Gate as something that controlled alchemy and had once stolen the bodies of their young friends, but even they could tell that having something wrong with it probably wouldn't be good for the rest of the world either.

"Well…I'm not _exactly_ sure. But it's the only reason I can think of why this would be happening. Those little black monsters running around everywhere? I've seen them inside the Gate before. The only thing I can think of is that the Gate must have somehow let some of them out."

"But what does that have to do with the fact that alchemy won't work for everyone else?" asked Mustang impatiently.

"That's the part I don't understand. In theory, there should still be enough alchemy in the Gate for us to borrow it in this world, like we always do."

"How do we get them back into the Gate?"

Al scratched his head, frustrated. "I don't really know. The Gate is—theoretically—on a separate plane from this one. I guess you could even call it a different world. The monsters shouldn't be here at all, and there's no way to push the monsters into the Gate because it doesn't actually exist here."

Havoc and Breda simultaneously tilted their heads to the side. "A different world?" asked Havoc.

Al nodded. "I know how it sounds, but that's one of the few accepted theories about the Gate. That it exists on a different plane. Every time someone in this world uses alchemy, it's borrowed from the world in the Gate. Only now, a lot of the alchemy has found its way over here, and that's probably making it hard for the Gate to regulate alchemy."

The office was silent for a few moments.

"So," Havoc said slowly. "What exactly are we supposed to do about this?"

Al gave a stretched grin. "I have no idea."

Havoc grinned back, his cigarette tilting precariously. "Isn't that our line?"

The office door opened suddenly to reveal a rather harassed looking redheaded woman who was breathing as though she had run a mile. "Brigadier-General…Mustang," she panted, "there's someone…on the phone for you."

"Tell them I'll call back."

"He says…it's urgent, sir. There's someone over in…Major Pierce's jurisdiction." She took a deep breath. "Pierce says he knows about the situation with all of the…monsters and everything."

"What? Get him on the phone."

The woman shook her head. "He won't talk. Pierce arrested him this morning after he captured one of the creatures somehow…but the guy won't answer any questions. That's why he called. He wants you to interrogate him, since Aquaroya is in your jurisdiction anyway. He said you're better at interrogations. He's probably right, sir," she added. It was rather well-known that Major Pierce had something of a temper.

Mustang glanced at Hawkeye, who smiled and said something about getting a car.

"Fine," Mustang growled. "_I'll_ make him talk."

.

The trip there was fairly uneventful, considering that everyone in Amestris was on alert for the alchemic monsters. The few creatures that Mustang and Hawkeye saw on the journey were the small black blobs like the one from earlier, and most of them were doing relatively harmless things like laughing maniacally, chasing birds, lifting women's skirts, or throwing rocks at people.

They stopped the car on the outskirts of Aquaroya, as the streets became to narrow to drive farther into the city. Mustang saw no signs of any structural damage on any of the bridges they passed, though he had no idea which part of the city the monster from this morning would have been in. The pair of them hurried down the busy streets and through crowds of people who were much calmer than those in Central, likely because the worst of the creatures they had seen had already been captured.

Toward the center of the city was the small military station, and Mustang reached the door and threw it open. Angry and frustrated that someone _had _answers about this confusing and hopeless situation but refused to reveal them, he glanced around the room until his eyes fell on the grey-haired Major Pierce, who was sitting at a desk in the corner and rubbing the bridge of his nose in the way of one who has a severe headache. He pointed to a door on the far wall.

Mustang stormed forward, throwing the door open, already beginning to speak. "Alright, you little—"

"WHO ARE YOU CALLING _LITTLE?"_

The man froze, and from the silence behind him, he assumed that Hawkeye had done the same.

"_Fullmetal?_"

The blonde in question recovered from his surprise enough to grin. "You know, Mustang, I have to say…it's almost good to see you."

.

.

.

**A/N: **Can I just say that it's really annoying that Mustang has been promoted in this story? I keep writing "Colonel Mustang" and I have to go back and change it. Oh well. Kudos to him for the promotion, anyway.

As always, thanks to everyone who reviewed, especially my anonymous reviewers that I can't PM back. You are all wonderful people!

Thanks again for sticking with me. Please review!

~ket

**Next Chapter: **Genii and Alchemical Theory 101


	4. Genii and Alchemical Theory 101

**.:Four:.**

**Genii and Alchemical Theory 101**

.

It was dark by the time they left the small military building in Aquaroya. The last reminder of the sun was a dim purple strip to the west, and the air had quickly become cold in a reminder that fall was approaching. Roy had gruffly loaned his coat to the shirtless Ed, who accepted more gratefully that his commanding officer would have expected. Roy had thought that Ed would have complained during the long walk through Aquaroya's narrow streets to the car, but the blonde alchemist seemed remarkably content.

"I _told _him I was the Fullmetal Alchemist," Ed spoke suddenly, breaking into his superior officer's thoughts. "He should have believed me."

"Yeah, well, it's not every day that dead shrimp come back to life," Roy retorted almost casually. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Hawkeye roll her eyes at her superior officer's immaturity.

Edward visibly struggled not to shout, but Roy thought he heard a word that sounded suspiciously like _bastard_. "I doubt he believed you anyway," he said aloud.

"He might have believed _you_ if you'd actually answered his questions. Legally dead or not, as a state alchemist you should have helped with the problem in any way possible. Why didn't you?"

"Like hell I was going to tell _that _idiot. He probably wouldn't have even known what I was talking about," Ed scoffed, and Roy was suddenly reminded of the stubborn and arrogant alchemist he was used to. "Besides," Ed added after a moment's silence, "if he _had _believed me, it probably would have gotten me locked away somewhere in a lab or something."

Roy had noted that Ed still had at least one metal appendage. There was no sign that he'd lost anything else in the sacrifice for Al's body, which Roy didn't understand. "If you won't tell him, tell me. What _did_ happen to you?"

Ed was silent for a few moments. The light was dim, but as they passed under a streetlight, Roy could see that his mouth was firmly closed. After a moment, Roy was about to begin pressing the question when Ed spoke.

"Where's Al?" Ed asked softly, and for the first time Roy caught an undertone of uncertainty and maybe even sadness in his tone. The Brigadier General was actually somewhat surprised; he had expected those words to be the first out of Ed's mouth. After glancing in the alchemist's direction to see Ed staring determinedly at the sky, braced as though expecting a damaging blow, Roy suddenly understood that he was afraid.

"He's fine," Hawkeye answered.

Ed's head shot to face her so quickly that the Brigadier-General thought he must have had whiplash. "Really?" The look on his face was almost desperate, and he was clutching at the jacket Roy had loaned him with white knuckles.

"Yes. We saw him this morning," Hawkeye said softly. "He's in Central right now, trying to help out wherever he can. He's fine. He's perfectly healthy, and I'm sure he'll be glad to see you."

"He's a state alchemist?" Ed asked, and Roy couldn't decipher the tone of his voice.

"No. He's been researching ways to get you back, traveling all over the country in search of clues, living off the money you've saved and spending all of his time in the library. He does the same kinds of things he did when he was with you. He just checks in every now and then to say hello. When we called the office back just now, we told everyone—including Al—that we received some news and that they should hang around until we got back. He'll be at Central when we get there."

Edward had gone back to staring at the sky, but Roy was able to see a dim smile when one of the streetlights lit his face.

The walk back seemed farther than Roy remembered, and Edward was walking sluggishly with an odd look of contentment on his face that Roy could not understand. When the alchemist saw his superior looking at him with a questioning look on his face, the blond announced happily that he was very tired. Obviously whatever had happened recently had messed with his mind.

They reached the car a few moments later and clambered in wordlessly. Hawkeye started the engine with practiced ease and flicked the headlights on as she began the long drive home. Roy glanced at Edward in the back of the car.

"_Now, _would you mind explaining where you've been? If it's not too much for your _little _brain?"

"Would you _stop_—?" Ed began, but Hawkeye interrupted.

"Sir, I have to say that it would be great if you would try to be a little more mature than Edward."

The Fullmetal Alchemist couldn't help but crack a grin at the sullen expression on Roy's face. "I missed you, Hawkeye," he said with a laugh. The woman smiled into the rearview mirror. Ed paused, offering Roy a wry smile. "Hell, I was so bored I even missed _you, _Colonel Bastard."

"That's _Brigadier-General _Bastard to you."

"_You _got a _promotion?_"

Roy shot him a sour look before adding, "So did you. Posthumously. Though who knows what will happen when they find out you're alive."

"What rank am I?"

"Lieutenant Colonel. But you'd still be working under me, of course," Roy said.

The young alchemist opened his mouth to object, but his words turned into a yawn. Roy could hear him shifting for a few moments to get more comfortable in the lumpy seat. Dimly watching the scenery as it rushed past, Roy realized that he was unlikely to get any more answers out of the kid until they got to Central.

The road back was dark and quiet; every once in a while, a few lights poked their way through the black countryside. Roy wondered whether this was what people meant when they said "the calm before the storm." It seemed strange that the creatures should become so quiet at night, but perhaps they just explored in silence whenever there were no humans around to annoy.

The Brigadier-General's musings were interrupted by a slight noise from the backseat. Ed spoke. "How long has it been?"

Roy twisted in his seat to look at Ed. The teen had lay down in the back of the car with his entwined hands cradling his head. He was observing his commanding officer silently through half-closed golden eyes. "What do you mean?" Roy asked.

"Since I…left."

"A little over a year," Roy said, and Hawkeye nodded in confirmation.

"Oh," the alchemist said quietly.

A mile or so later, Roy asked, "Why?" but Edward had already fallen asleep.

.

As the car got closer to Central a little over an hour later, they became aware of more of the creatures. Perhaps it was because the things could see better in the lighted streets, or perhaps it was because the creatures themselves enjoyed being around people they could torment. Either way, Roy began to notice some of the creatures—mostly the little dark ones, whatever they were—raiding shops or homes, or playing with the streetlights. There were many more military men patrolling the streets than usual, and Roy assumed that Fuhrer Hakuro had ordered more protection for the city.

Roy felt Hawkeye tense beside him. "Sir? There's a…" She trailed off, obviously at a loss for words. He glanced in the direction of her stare and blinked, quickly fumbling to reach Ed in the backseat of the car.

"Fullmetal. _Fullmetal. _Wake _up!_"

"Wha…hmm?" Ed sat up groggily. He grinned suddenly. "I forgot to ask," he said through a yawn, "why you decided to become a pirate since we last met?"

Roy rolled his good eye and pointed toward the window. "I think it's time you explain what you know about the situation. And you can start by telling us what the hell _that_ thing is."

The alchemist rubbed his eyes slowly as though not quite sure of what he was seeing. "S'okay," he said after a moment. "It's just a Howler."

"Just a _what_?"

The Beast in question was not "just" anything. It was roughly the size of a baby elephant, with thick grey fur and four clawed feet. At the moment, Roy couldn't make out any eyes or nose on the creature, presumably because it was asleep; it had curled into a ball against the side of a bakery, half into the street, and was snoring rather loudly. The _major_ reason Roy was so worried—other than the fact that it was enormous and clawed—was that its mouth stretched to both sides of its head and was filled with a great deal of extremely large teeth that jutted out crookedly up and down. Its eyes, nose, and ears must have been tiny, because Roy couldn't even see them past the huge teeth.

"It looks pretty bad," Ed admitted, "but pretty much all they do is sleep. They'll get jumpy if you get too close to them, but otherwise they'll do their own thing."

Roy glared at Ed. "I'm sure it uses the teeth for _something._"

"Yeah, but it only eats Gatekeepers."

"What is a—"

"You know," Ed said tiredly as he lay back down, "those little black ones with big eyes and weird smiles. There are millions of them, at least in Aquaroya. You must have seen some here by now."

"Yes, but—"

"I assume it's called a Howler for obvious reasons?" Hawkeye interrupted.

"Yeah," Ed said, "they make this weird howling noise when they're angry, kind of like a cross between a wolf and a boat horn. Couldn't be bothered to think of a better name than that."

"You named it?"

"Course. There wasn't anyone else in the Gate, was there?"

"That's how you know so much about these things? Because you were in the Gate with them?" Roy interrupted.

"Obviously."

"And you _survived_?"

"No. I died."

"No need to be sarcastic."

"I wasn't being sarcastic," Ed murmured as his breathing began to even out again. Roy hadn't even noticed that Hawkeye had stopped the car to look at the sleeping creature—the Howler—until they began moving forward again; they made their way back to Central in relative silence. Roy noticed, however, that though Ed's breathing had slowed, his eyes were still half-open as he absentmindedly played with the edges of the coat as though to calm his nerves.

.

By the time they reached headquarters, Ed was sitting up in his seat, tapping softly on the window. Hawkeye barely had the chance to stop the car before he hopped out and slammed the door closed behind him. "This way," Mustang said as they walked through the main doors. "They changed the office location after we all got promoted to give us more room."

Ed nodded curtly and followed his commanding officer to the room; when they finally reached the door and were close enough to hear voices on the other side, Mustang paused with his hand on the knob.

"I'll tell him to come out so you can see him alone first," Mustang said gently.

"Thanks," Ed said with an anxious grin. Mustang opened the door and he and Hawkeye entered, leaving Edward to fidget outside, fingering the gold buttons on Mustang's jacket and shifting his weight nervously. A whole _year_ had passed since he had seen Alphonse. A _year_. Who knew how his brother had changed? And what if there had been any side effects from bringing his body back? Was Al any different now? The seconds seemed to stretch on infinitely, until the door opened and—

"_Brother?_"

Al was staring at him, wide-eyed.

The Fullmetal Alchemist let out an undignified, strangled cry as he leapt forward, and Al threw out his arms to grab him. The pair of them seemed caught between laughing and crying. Al was shaking, though that might have had something to do with the fact that Ed was hugging him so hard he could barely breathe. They finally drew back, though neither seemed to be able to stop touching the other; they began to speak quickly, understanding each other through some connection that had never really faded, in the way that only close siblings can.

"I can't believe you're okay—!"

"—_no idea _how hard I've been looking for you!"

"—thought that the transmutation hadn't even _worked_!"

"I _knew _you were alive!"

Alphonse suddenly ran a hand—_a flesh hand, _Edward thought happily—down Ed's arm and frowned. "But—you still have automail."

"Its fine, Al. I can live with the automail," Edward said quietly, "and the last thing I want to do is mess with the Gate again." His brother let out a little sigh, and Ed thought it was the most wonderful sound in the world because it was not muffled by metal. What he said instead was, "You look so old."

Alphonse smiled. "It must be strange seeing me as a fifteen-year-old instead of a ten-year-old," he remarked. "I never got the time in between."

The pair of them settled into a contented hush. "I'm really glad you came back alright, Brother," Al declared softly.

Ed couldn't articulate everything he wanted to say in response to that, so he wrapped his brother in a fierce hug instead.

.

The reactions of Mustang's subordinates were somewhere between Mustang's cordiality and Al's enthusiasm. Once they moved past their initial shock (Havoc's mouth opened so far that his cigarette rolled out, and Fuery dropped the stack of papers he had been carrying), they welcomed Ed rowdily. Breda thumped him on the back so much that Ed thought he might have bruises, and Havoc caught him in a tight hug and then wouldn't stop ruffling his hair.

"Shit, Boss," Havoc said, grinning as Hawkeye glared at him for his language, "I had the feeling we'd see you back here again one day. If anyone could come back from the dead, it'd be you."

"And I've done _that _a number of times," Ed murmured dryly to himself.

"You never know," Mustang speculated, "maybe if other people offered themselves up to the Gate, they'd all have come back as well. Fullmetal is the only person stupid enough to have tried."

Breda and Havoc howled in laughter as Ed glared.

"So you ended up in the Gate?" Falman interjected, leaning back onto a desk. "How did you get out of it? It's not every day that people come back from the dead."

Breda picked up his trail of thought. "And _you _happened to do it on the exact same day that all these…these…"

"Beasts?" Ed supplied helpfully.

"—yes, _Beasts_, start appearing all over Amestris."

"All over the world," corrected Fuery.

"_You_ had something to do with all of this, didn't you?" Havoc asked, with a sly grin.

"Of course he did," Mustang said through a smirk. "He couldn't have just _gotten out; _he had to do it in a way that would make trouble for everyone else."

"I did not!" Ed exclaimed indignantly. "I didn't even get out on my own. I just kind of…showed up." He said, waving his arms vaguely.

"Showed up?" Al asked. "Just like the monsters—Beasts—started showing up?"

"I guess so," the blond said, taking the liberty of sinking into Havoc's office chair. His brother settled on the desk beside him. "One second I was there and the next…I wasn't. I didn't even do anything to get out." The telephone in Mustang's office began to ring. The Brigadier-General shot it a glare, but it was otherwise ignored.

"What was it like?" Al murmured suddenly. "The Gate?"

Ed shifted uncomfortably, rolling his shoulders and leaning backwards in the chair. "At first," he began thoughtfully, "it was like a really bad dream. Things change there _constantly. _It's—one minute I would be walking in a field and the next I'd be in the bottom of the ocean. Or find out that I was surrounded by fire, or that I was in one of the Beasts territories. It was the worst thing, because just as I started feel safe in the damn place, it would change on me." He paused. "But then I got used to it. After a while, it got really boring."

"Boring? How could it have been boring?" Havoc asked.

"Were you ever attacked by the Beasts?" Breda interjected.

"All the time! If I ended up in their territory, I'd be eaten or attacked. I always had to watch out for different territories. Water was where the Anglers were, the Pyro lived in the fire fields, and there were these things in the storms as well…I got killed a lot," he said sheepishly.

"Killed?" Mustang asked with alarm, looking at Ed as though afraid for his mental health. Al's mouth slipped into an anxious frown.

"It's because the amount of alchemy within the Gate is regulated," Al realized suddenly, without taking his eyes off of his brother. Edward could practically hear the wheels turning in his head. All eyes were on him as his thoughts became focused. "The Gate is a closed or isolated system—with the exception of the energy flowing in and out due to equivalent exchange—so any energy inside of it stays inside of it, with the exception of alchemy we borrow to do transmutations in this world."

"_Exactly_," Ed leapt in as the other inhabitants in the room stared back and forth between the brothers. "Since I'm alive, I sort of…run on my own energy. So if I had died, the Gate would have lost some of the energy inside of it. So even if one of the Beasts killed me, I couldn't really die. It would have thrown the energy levels out of balance."

Havoc's mouth opened and closed a few times. "Geniuses," he muttered to himself.

"Genii," Alphonse and Edward corrected absently.

"Right."

"Anyway," Al said wearily, "I've been rereading a few theories about the Gate since this morning, and I think…since the Gate is based on an array, is it possible that some of the alchemic energy within the Gate has escaped because Gate itself has finally worn down? Like an old alchemy array?"

"An array?" Hawkeye asked. "What do you mean?"

"Sometimes, over time, they start weakening and even malfunctioning," Ed said vaguely.

Alphonse scratched the back of his head in a strange, familiar way. "I've been doing a lot of research on the Gate since you…disappeared," he said, fumbling slightly for the last word. "There are lots of legends from different areas about how the Gate was formed, but the one that is the most prevalent is the one that I think is most likely to be true."

He faced his brother pensively, both of them aware of the role reversal: Ed was usually more prone to research, facts, and theories, and Al was the one who listened patiently and offered corrections. Ed's lips quirked up as he nodded for his brother to continue. "The gist of it is that the Gate was manmade. A long time ago, probably more than a few thousand years ago, there was no Gate. Alchemy was wilder than it is now, and it existed all over the world. People could use it freely; there _was _no such thing as equivalent exchange—at least it wouldn't seem like it, at first—because nothing was taken in return for a gain. But in reality, something was taken. Before the Gate, most of the alchemic energy in the world existed _inside _of the people themselves."

Edward hesitated. "Then it sounds like all of the old fairy tales—the ones about magic and witches."

"No, not exactly. Although…it's possible that the fairy tales originated from this time period..." Al shook his head. "But that's for another time. Anyway, if it was like magic, the people could have used as much alchemic energy as they wanted. But they _couldn't_. It wasn't magic but a form of energy, or something more like a part of people's normal energy or strength. The person's own energy was converted into alchemic energy in a transmutation, and they could gain it back by resting and regaining strength just as they would if they had used normal energy.

"But there were other sources of alchemic energy as well, in different creatures," Alphonse glanced at Ed, "I mean _Beasts_. There are hundreds of legends of different monsters that no one credits today: sea monsters, giant birds, dragons, forest guardians, invisible spirits...they all seem like myths now, because there are no signs that they ever actually existed, and we have no animals today that are anything like them. But there are theories that these legends were real at the time the Gate was created."

"So what happened?" Havoc wondered. Breda looked a little lost, but Hawkeye was thoughtfully tapping the handle of her handgun. "Why did things change?"

"That's what we'll need to find out," Al said. "The general theory is that they were somehow able to create the Gate using some type of array, but the amount of energy needed for something like that…well, it seems nearly impossible, for one thing." He glanced at Ed. "We need to do more research—to figure out whythey created the Gate, and what type of array. I can't even imagine how they could have gotten the energy to create another plane, let alone figuring out _how _to do it."

"I think we've got the 'why,'" Mustang said wryly. "Having Beasts running wild across the country, destroying towns and cities on the way…well, it's not exactly pleasant."

"I kind of agree with their thinking," Havoc added.

Al nodded. "And then they would have needed to somehow regulate the exchange, to create an equivalent exchange."

Ed rested his head on the back of the chair, his limbs inexplicably heavy. "Well, the Gatekeepers do it now. Those black things. They're the ones that collect something in exchange for alchemy. Even if they have to take something by force," he added with a grimace.

"So it's completely subjective," Al said flatly.

"Right," Ed murmured.

"Anyway," Mustang interrupted, "that only means that there's not much we can do tonight. But the two of you will have to research as fast as possible. I'm not sure how long we'll be able to keep up with—this."

"We can figure this out, Brother. Just like old times," Al said, offering Ed a tentative smile. "I've been researching the Gate, and you've been insideit. Between the two of us, we'll come up with _something_ to mend the array."

"Of course," Ed returned the smile, thinking back to all of the situations they'd gotten themselves out of. He almost added that they'd had it worse before, but his mouth grew wider and wider in a yawn. He shut it suddenly with an audible snap. "Sorry," he said wryly at the humor-filled glances directed at him. "Long day."

"And it's getting late," added Hawkeye, always the voice of reason. "None of us will be of any use if we're exhausted, not even you two. You should head back to the dorms. You can figure things out tomorrow." She glanced at Mustang, who nodded, unsurprisingly.

"You should all head home. I've talked to Brigadier-General Banton about setting up shifts so that we'll have teams on call overnight, but come in early tomorrow morning just the same. Get some rest. I have the feeling we'll need it soon."

The officers shuffled to gather their belongings, and Al dragged Ed from the chair. Ed stretched and stuffed his hands into his pockets as the pair of them headed for the door.

"Don't disappear on us again, Boss," Havoc said, almost seriously. Hawkeye and Breda both paused to offer him smiles.

Ed grinned. "'Course not," he said. "You're stuck with me. Besides, things are too interesting here to leave it all behind."

.

.

.

**A/N: **So sorry for the long delay—real life stepped in and handed me a paper that took much longer to write than anticipated. Thanks to all of my reviewers, in the meantime, especially the anonymous reviewers to whom I can't respond. You all make my day!

Anyway, my theory behind the Gate is probably a bit odd, so if you find something small that I overlooked, feel free to leave me a message. If you find a huge, gaping hole, be so kind as to look the other way, because I'm far too lazy to fix something like that. :D

**Random things, in case you're interested:**

**1. **You're probably thinking to yourself, "Wow. Beasts and Howlers and Anglers (oh my)…could she possibly have come up with worse names for the monsters?" Originally I planned on doing all sorts of really in-depth research, because I love naming things and finding names that mean certain things, but then I realized that Ed was naming the Beasts. And even if he'd had a million years in the Gate, he's not the type to care if they had cool names or not; he would just call them whatever came to mind. So I had to abandon my quest all for the sake of the stupid main character. Blame Ed, people.

**2. **Thanks to the anonymous reviewer who pointed out that Ed can't really zip his mouth closed while handcuffed to a desk! Wow…just wow. I blame tiredness for that little slip-up. The last chapter is edited.

**3. **Finally, (disclaimer) the geniuses/genii thing between Ed and Al in this chapter is something I couldn't help adding and comes from the Artemis Fowl series.

Thanks for reading! Please review.

~ket

**Next Chapter: **Must Be That Irresistible Mustang Charm


	5. Must Be That Irresistible Mustang Charm

**.:Five:.**

**Must Be That Irresistible Mustang Charm**

.

Ed awoke gradually the next morning with the disconcerting tension of someone who doesn't quite remember where he is. Feeling oddly exposed, he opened his eyes blearily and lifted his head. The sheets that had covered him lay on the floor next to the twin bed.

He flopped back on his pillow, looking around the room. It was a familiar and lifeless place, just cozy enough to be comfortable. The dorms were always like that. Ed couldn't remember staying in this particular room before, but they were all nearly identical anyway, with two twin beds—one for him and one for Al…whose bed was empty.

Sitting up slowly, he stretched his arms above his head, feeling a strange friction on his shoulders. He looked down in brief surprise at the shirt he was wearing. It had been ages since he'd felt any sort of material on his chest. He had sacrificed himself by marking his bare torso, and he'd spent his time in the gate the same way…

At any rate, Al had loaned him one of his shirts last night, and to Ed's chagrin, it fit perfectly. Yesterday, Ed had had a difficult time taking his eyes off of his brother, who was both familiar and achingly foreign at once. Or at least it had been difficult until his head hit the pillow. He had been so exhausted that he was pretty sure he'd fallen asleep mid-sentence. At the very least, Al had taken his shoes and socks off.

He yawned widely, sliding from the bed and padding out of the room in his bare feet. The cramped kitchen was lit in candle light only, which, coupled with the chill in the air, suggested to Ed that the electricity and heating had gone out at some point in the night. But what was most important was that Alphonse sat at the kitchen table, drinking something that Ed had sorely missed: coffee. Al smiled as he walked in and pushed a mug toward his brother.

"You haven't changed at all," he said with a laugh. "The best way to get you up and out of bed is always to move all of your blankets."

The coffee warmed Ed's throat on the way down. "Why is it so early?" he moaned as he caught a glimpse of the sky outside through the open window. It was barely light out. It couldn't have been past six in the morning.

"Did you really think we were going to get a full night's sleep?" Al asked with a familiar smile. It was the soft smile he'd always had, before the armor. It was strange seeing it again, after all these years, but not in a bad way. And his eyes were like his mother's, both green and brown at once as though they couldn't decide which was better.

Ed suddenly realized Al was waiting for a response to a statement he hadn't heard. "What?"

"Captain Hawkeye called a few minutes ago to wake us up. Or she woke _me _up, anyway. There's trouble, and they need someone who actually knows what's going on," he added, looking at Ed pointedly.

"So this is a punishment for knowing too much?" Ed groaned.

"Only you would think of it that way, Brother," Al said, amused, as he stood. "The Captain is sending a car. It'll be here in five minutes, and you need to get dressed. You'll have to borrow more of my clothes."

"Thanks," he said as Al took a candle and walked back into the bedroom. He leaned back a little in his chair, steadying himself with a hand against the wall to stare through the door at his brother, who was busy rummaging through his trunk. Al's hair was cropped shorter than Ed's, almost the way it had been when they were younger, but it was long enough to fall into his eyes as he searched. He brushed it out of the way and looked up to see Ed watching him. "What?"

"You're different than I remembered," he said bluntly, because Al knew him well enough not to take it the wrong way.

"You're exactly how I remembered," his brother said with a grin, one that suddenly looked almost smug. "_Exactly_."

Ed instantly knew what his brother meant. "I couldn't grow," he growled defensively, without much bite. Al had always been the one of the only people whose remarks about height Ed managed to tolerate.

"I know, I know—because the Gate is balanced and wouldn't let you change in any way. So you're sixteen in your mind, but your body looks fifteen," he laughed, "and you're as tall as I am."

Ed grimaced. "Who are you calling a pipsqueak so tiny you can't even see?" he barked. His brother just smiled and tossed him some clothes, black pants like Ed was used to but with a blue shirt and dark jacket instead. There was a knock on the door, and Al shoved his brother into the bathroom.

"Hurry and get dressed," Al urged. "That'll be the officer Hawkeye sent. Besides, it's time for you to do what you do best."

"What's that?" asked Ed.

Al shot him a mischievous grin. "Show off."

.

The first thing Ed thought as the car approached the disaster area was that Mustang must have accidentally managed to blow up half the street. Once he looked more closely, though, he realized that this was probably not the case. Which was almost too bad, in his opinion, because it could have provided a million opportunities for taunting his commanding officer in the future.

The rattling car had wound past several buildings that were partially or completely on fire, and rubble and debris from fallen structures littered the road, making it hard for their anxious driver to maneuver the car forward. People were being carried limply from collapsing buildings, and huge hoses were drawn out like bright green snakes across the pavement. As they drove on, they began to pass more and more military officers who were running about in uniforms streaked with dark soot.

Ed spotted part of Mustang's unit further down the street. Havoc and Breda were aiming hoses at the nearest burning building. Hawkeye and a few other unfamiliar officers had their guns drawn but lowered. They were warily watching a group of black Keepers, some of whom were bouncing on the roof of a blackened car and some of whom appeared to be daring each other to get close to the fire, laughing eerily all the while. Mustang was shouting orders farther away, dark in contrast to the enormous cloud of orange-grey smoke and flame that twisted in a tall column behind him.

The road was blocked partway by the remains of a fallen lamppost, so Al and Ed leapt from the car and walked the rest of the way on foot. Mustang glanced at them as they approached, his good eye filled with something like relief. Ed caught his eye and flicked his gaze from the roaring fire to his commanding officer, grinning. Mustang caught on immediately, his face darkening. "It wasn't _me!_" he said.

His commanding officer—or was he? Come to think of it, Ed wasn't entirely sure that one was still considered a member of the military after being missing for a year—began to explain the situation without preamble.

"Good thing you're here," he said over the roaring of the fire and the shouting of his men. He wiped his brow, and his hand left a trail of soot behind. "It'd be great if you could make sense of some of this mess. We received word of a spreading fire about an hour ago. No one's sure what caused it, but it's spreading faster than anything we've ever seen. The fire leaves behind—well, traces. Just like an alchemical fire. It's not natural, and we've gotten no further in stopping it since we've been here. It just moves from one area to the next," he said, shaking his head and turning toward one of the burning buildings, where Breda was struggling to beat back the flames with the water hose.

"Not sure how much help I'll be, Mustang," Ed said carefully. "If this is just another consequence of opening the gate …" His eyes drifted as though drawn to the cloud of dark grey smoke that burst from behind the burning building.

The air was sooty and grey, and it was hard to see through the fog-like patches, but Ed could just make out _something _amid the soot and bursts of orange. "Well, there's your problem," he said slowly, pointing. "It's not just the gate, then…"

"What, the smoke?" Mustang asked, craning his head as though it would help him to better see around the building.

"No," Ed corrected. "It's what's _in _the smoke that's the problem. It's a Pyro," he said, giving his own word for the nameless creature and shuddering slightly at the memory of harsh flames. "The fire's probably the work of that Beast."

"Fantastic," Mustang muttered acidly, still peering distractedly into the smoke.

"Do you know a way that we can stop it, Brother?"

Ed shrugged, blinking soot from his eyes. "I don't know," he said doubtfully. "Pyros…they're trouble."

"What exactly _is _it, Fullmetal?" Mustang asked. "Does it have a weak spot?"

Ed couldn't stop a laugh from escaping his lips. "I've never actually _seen _one before! They're always covered in that grey smoke…"

"Well, it's probably made up of fire on the outside, right?" Al asked, watching as a few bright flares coughed their way through the heavy smoke. "Can't we just put it out?"

"I don't think so," Ed said. "It just makes them back down. Their stomachs are hot—like fire, or maybe lava—so they eat only things that burn easily. Fuel. It's probably eating something even now…" He paused. "I mean, if you can manage to lead it to water and drown it, you're golden. But they're pretty big, and Central isn't exactly known for its large bodies of water…"

"Brigadier-General Mustang, sir!" They turned to see Hawkeye approaching in quick strides. "The fire's spreading again, sir. We'll need to start moving out of its way soon." Behind her, the officers were tugging the fire equipment away from the blaze. The fire engines were already rushing away, probably off to fight the fire from a better location.

Mustang nodded. "Give us a minute," he said, and then looked back at Ed, his face grim. "How likely is it to attack?"

"Not very," Ed said slowly. "Once they find something decent to eat, they'll sit there forever. So it's peaceful. Considering. It'll probably only attack or eat someone if provoked."

The Brigadier-General nodded. "Alright. We just have to find a way to get rid of it." He started down toward his men, rattling off orders to move back from the fire.

"How do you know so much about this…Pyro," Al asked suddenly, "if you don't even know what it looks like? The fire in its stomach?" His face was bright; the fire had crept closer before Ed had even realized.

Ed gave his brother a grim smile. "You know, Al. I can only talk about the things I've seen firsthand..."

Al's expression was horrible. Not quite pity, but his eyes grew wide enough that Ed had to clap him on the shoulder. "It's nothing, Al," he said quietly, "I'm fine now."

"Brother—"

A cacophony of yelling interrupted whatever Al had been about to say, for which Ed was grateful. The pair of them spun around to see the fire creeping toward them even more quickly, with the tower of grey smoke and flames trailing just behind. Mustang and Hawkeye were just before it, retreating as the creature moved out from the side of the building.

Most of the officers were left to avoid the flames on foot. The fire was not progressing fast enough to be life-threatening, but its steady spread was both frightening and unnatural.

"What's it doing, Fullmetal?" Mustang asked as he caught up to where the Elric brothers were backing away. "Isn't it supposed to be peaceful and _not _chase people?"

"It's not _supposed _to. Not unless something…maybe it didn't take well to all of the fire extinguishing." Ed muttered to himself. "I don't understand."

"Well, _try _to!" Mustang yelled.

"I don't think you're helping, sir," Hawkeye rebuked as they all continued to move away from the flames, which were flickering forward even more quickly now. She changed trajectory a bit, moving away at a slant and motioning for the others to follow, which they did.

So did the Pyro, moving after them deliberately, confidently. It was gaining on them so much that they were forced to turn around to jog rather than back away slowly.

There was a shout of alarm in the distance. Gunshots. Suddenly, Havoc and Breda burst from around the side of the Beast, guns in their hands, with Falman hurrying after them.

"These aren't even slowing it down," Breda said, waving his handgun in the air. He holstered it and looked about quickly. "We can't stay here."

Hawkeye frowned. "The street's too wide. Whatever it is, it looks like we might be safer if we head through the Market District."

"Agreed," Ed said as he and Al began jogging through the open street and toward the safety of Central's shopping district. Ed looked back as they ran; over the shoulders of Mustang's men, he could just make out the twisting grey-orange tower of smoke, which was smoothly trailing behind them, ash and dust billowing around it as it moved.

He swore under his breath, wondering why the Pyro was so drawn to Mustang and his men. And something was bugging him, anyway: why was it moving so slowly? An angry Pyro could have easily and quickly swallowed anyone who'd pissed it off, but this one trailing behind them almost casually. Ed had no idea what the hell was going on.

They reached the narrow alleyways of the Market District, which was crammed with tall buildings and shopping displays that cluttered the sidewalks. Ed and Al came to a halt about thirty feet in, and the others stopped as well, looking back. The early morning light was not yet high enough to reach them, nestled as they were between the tall buildings, and the shadows only made it easier to see the Pyro as it grew closer to them. The odd jets of flame that burst from the smoke brightened the narrow street in flashes, like fireworks.

"We need a plan," Mustang said quietly, pacing. The Beast was right up against the sides of the buildings, and as best as Ed could figure out, it was prodding itself as if to see whether it could fit through the opening. "We can't keep running forever."

"What _is _that thing?" Havoc asked, shaking his head. Breda and Falman mirrored his expression of astonishment.

"Like I said earlier," Ed noted, ignoring the question, "the only way I know of to kill it is by tricking it into water. They can't see very well with all the smoke, so it's not too hard. But I don't think there's anything deep enough to drown it here…" he paused, "…unless you just want to trap it somewhere? It worked well enough yesterday."

There was a silence, in which everyone puzzled over how that could work. At this distance, they could hear snorts and snuffling as the creature continued trying to press itself into the narrow street.

"The stadium's only a few blocks away," Falman said finally. "And the main entrance doors in front should be wide enough for it to fit through…" As one, they peered at the tower of smoke. There was really no telling how large the Beast was.

"It'll fit," Ed said confidently. "The doors have to be twenty, twenty-five feet across. It's just a matter of getting it there."

"What about the yard?" Havoc asked. Ed turned to him, confused. "In front of the stadium," Havoc clarified. "The huge yard, with grass and benches. It might be hard to lure it there if it can run us down in all that open space."

"There's a fountain," Al added. "I don't know that it will be much help, but…"

"We'll split up," Mustang said decisively. All eyes swiveled to him. "Some of us will create a diversion and make sure that thing chases us. The rest of us will alert the Kessel's men and the fire brigades to make sure that backup will be waiting at the stadium."

Hawkeye's face looked grim, as though she had reservations about the dangerous plan, but she was the first to nod. The others followed suit. "Let's go," she said.

There was a side alley to their left. They took it, and the air cleared before them as they escaped the Pyro's billowing, ashy smoke. Almost as soon as they disappeared from view, a roar echoed through the streets.

They took another side street to the right, hopping over vendor's stands and the merchandise that now littered the street. Mustang turned to see that everyone had followed and gave them a look that said, _Ready? _He sprinted out into the open street, a two-car road that the Pyro would have better access to, and the rest of them followed. From around the side of a building the Beast came, thundering after them to eat away the distance between it and its prey.

Vaguely, Ed felt eyes on him. The streets _felt _abandoned, and most people appeared to have gotten out of the city when the monsters came and the electricity fizzled out. But as they streaked past the grimy buildings, Ed could just make out frightened faces in the dim windows.

Someone shoved him, and he started. "Go, boss!" Havoc panted. The street split off into two ahead. "We've got this one for now. You and Al get us some help."

"Wait!" Hawkeye cried. "The creature in Aquaroya followed—isn't it more likely to chase Ed?"

"We'll be fine," Ed said, and before they could argue, he grabbed his brother by the sleeve and dragged him to the right as Mustang and his men ran off in the opposite direction.

After a few paces, the thundering din of the Beast's footsteps began to fade away. Ed chanced a look behind him and saw the smoke receding into the distance down the street. He and Al slowed to an easy jog. "At least I know _this _one doesn't hold grudges," Ed murmured to himself before turning to his brother. "Look—there's a telephone booth right over there," he said, pointing. "Call the fire brigade. They'll have a radio in all of the cars, so they'll get the message around. Tell them to hurry."

"What? What about you, Brother?"

"There's still a police station near the stadium, right?" Ed asked, without waiting for an answer as he began backing away toward where Mustang and his men had vanished into the smoke. "Meet me there!"

Al seemed to know there wasn't much time to argue, but he tried anyway. "What are you going to do, Brother?" he asked frantically.

"I'll figure out some way to help," Ed called as he took off running.

"How?" Al yelled, sounding annoyed. "There's no alchemy!"

"Then I guess I'll just have to follow them with a bucket of water," Ed muttered to himself.

.

The cloud of smoke didn't seem to be moving anymore, and it wasn't difficult to follow until Ed grew closer to it. Once he was near the Beast itself, the air became impossibly thick and warm, and ashes danced all around him and into his face and eyes. He knew he was close, could hear familiar shouts and something that sounded like gunshots, but he could barely see two feet in front of his face. After nearly running headfirst into a building for the second time, Ed had enough.

He let out a curse, which made him feel a bit better, and then decided to try this from a different angle. It took him a minute or two to figure out which way was _away _from the smoke, but once his vision began to clear, he walked until he found what he was looking for.

Ed clambered up the fire escape, the rusty metal nearly biting through the skin of his flesh hand as he threw himself upward. He blinked ashes out of his eyes and finally reached the rooftop. He wasn't entirely sure what he was going to do if he _found _Mustang and his men, but he felt he was probably best-equipped to figure something out and pressed on anyway.

As luck had it, Ed didn't have to look too hard. The smoke was billowing from the far corner of the building, and the shouts were coming from below. He rushed over and peered down to see Havoc, Breda, Falman, and Hawkeye shouting frantically and shooting into the smoke. The Beast was close, certainly close enough to attack them, but it wasn't moving at all.

What was going on? And if they were free to run, why…?

He realized what must have happened. The Beast was at the corner of the building, and Mustang's men were here, on the east side. The building to the north was very close, and the Beast was making the same snuffling noises it had earlier as it had tried to cram itself into an area that was too narrow.

Ed rushed to the north side of the building and looked down. Sure enough, through the haze and smoke that floated upward into his face, he could just make out a figure with dark hair and a blue military uniform.

He blinked in realization, and couldn't help but grin. "Of _course _it likes Mustang," Ed snickered. That might explain why it had followed them so slowly, at any rate: it was intrigued by something else marked by fire alchemy rather than angered.

The alleyway was a dead end, and Mustang was pressed against the wall. Ed couldn't see whether he was hurt or not through the heavy smog.

"You okay down there, Bastard?" Ed yelled.

"Fine," he heard through Beast's snuffling and angry growls. Mustang didn't seem surprised that Ed was there. "But the side of that building is starting to crack…"

"Okay, hang on!" Ed said, coughing. He walked carefully along the edge of the building, hugging the short railing as he looked for something, anything he could use. There wasn't much to work with. All he could see through the smoke was broken windows and damaged cars.

Then, through the grey, he caught a flash of red metal. A fire hydrant. The Beast was blocking the way for Mustang's men, who were only now beginning to spread out frantically. But Ed could get there faster. The building to the north was just close enough, he thought. There was a pile of rubble to his left where it looked like someone had kicked in the door to the roof, probably during the evacuations. A closer look revealed that the door was thick, and that it hadn't been damaged.

Ed pulled the door over the side of the building and laid it across. It just reached. The building groaned loudly beneath him.

Mustang had obviously noticed his insane scheme. "Fullmetal," he called out, "the building's _cracking. _Are you out of your—?"

But Ed rushed across before he could change his mind, careful not to make a false step in the gray haze. He could hear Mustang shouting, but paid him no mind. He found the fire escape quickly. His mouth was beginning to taste like ash, and the climb down felt much harder than the climb up.

It was almost surreal being this close to the Pyro. The smoke rolled out in billowing curtains, making Ed choke and blink his irritated eyes, and the Beast was so close that he could feel the warmth emanating from its thick skin. Luckily, though, the red fire hydrant was easy to spot, even in the thick haze. All he needed now was a wrench…_Or not_, he thought. His automail hand might be enough. The screw was larger than most, and he twisted it with all of his strength. The gears in the automail did most of the work, though, and within a minute the water pressure nearly took his hand off as it burst from the pipe, soaking the Pyro.

There was a loud roar, and Ed was suddenly inhaling hot steam. The smoking creature backed away hurriedly, away from Ed and the alleyway, and Ed was thankful that Mustang's men had cleared out of the area back there.

The smoke receded enough for Ed to see Mustang come out of the alleyway, dodging the water that continued to jet out of the hydrant.

Ed opened his mouth to say _looks like I'm back to saving your ass again, _but it might have come out better if he hadn't fallen into a fit of coughs.

Mustang thumped him once on the back, hard. "You idiot," he snarled. "You could have gotten yourself killed."

"Been there," Ed managed, wiping ash from his eyes.

Footsteps. "You look awful, boss," someone said from behind him. Ed and Mustang both turned to see Havoc, Falman, Breda, and Hawkeye, who stared at Ed with wide eyes.

Ed looked down. Standing above the Pyro's smoke for so long had allowed the soot to cling to his clothes, and he probably looked something like a chimney sweep.

He coughed again. "We still need to get that thing to the stadium," he said, changing the subject. The Pyro was still there, grumbling and grunting to itself a safe distance away from the spouting water.

"Let _us _take care of that," Hawkeye said. "You and Al need to make sure everything's arranged at the stadium. "

"Yeah, without water as backup, we might be screwed," Breda said wryly, ignoring Hawkeye's reproachful glare for his language.

"Well, the Pyro seems to have taken a liking to our favorite flame alchemist anyway," Ed said, noting from Mustang's surprised look that he hadn't quite made the connection yet. "I'm just not sure if it wants to eat you or love you forever," he laughed.

Havoc and Breda were trading grins that disappeared when Mustang turned around. "We'll keep moving, then," he said. "Just make sure the fire brigade is waiting," he called over his shoulder as he jogged off. His men followed. Ed watched as, after a moment's breath, the Pyro moved off down another street in the same direction Mustang had gone.

"Yeah," Ed said to himself. "I think it's true love."

.

By the time Ed tracked his brother down, he had a throbbing headache. Al jerked upright from where he had been leaning against the station wall in wait for Ed. His eyes flickered worriedly up and down Ed's soot-covered body, and Ed flashed him a smile.

"I'm fine," he said tiredly, pausing to cough again. "Just caught a bit of the barbecue."

Something in Al's expression looked disapproving, but he only swallowed and nodded his head toward the stadium. Ed turned to follow the movement, and saw a group of fifteen or twenty fire fighters readying their trucks near the central fountain in front of the stadium. There was only one hydrant, it seemed, and one farther across the street near a cluster of shops.

"With any luck, they'll be able to herd the Beast into the stadium," Al said as the two of them began moving toward the men. He gave his brother a sidelong glance. "And if Brigadier-General Mustang and the others are anywhere near as exhausted as you are, we'll need all the help we can get."

"I'm fine," Ed said, wondering how Al did that. He _was _tired, and his cough had only gotten worse. "Let's just get everything set up, okay?"

Al nodded, but kept a close eye on his brother as they further explained the situation to the firemen and helped to stretch the hoses across the wide lawn. The smoke from the Beast, which had been faint and distant only a few moments ago, was creeping steadily closer as Mustang and his men approached.

Somehow, small crowds were beginning to form around the stadium, and in the shops and houses that bordered the open area, people peered out of windows and hung out of doors, obviously aware that something was happening. The firemen and the odd military officer began shooing people away as the wind picked up, twisting the smoke in all directions. As the Beast neared, it became difficult to tell which street it was coming in from; the billowing smoke covered too much, and the breeze wasn't helping.

Mustang and Havoc burst forth from the smoke, vaguely sooty and obviously out of breath. Breda, Hawkeye, and Falman followed a few seconds later from the next street over, guns readied for whatever they were worth.

Then came the smoke. It rolled out in waves, engulfing the fire trucks—Ed heard one of the hoses spurt on, too late—and all of the trees and benches in the Beast's way. The firemen shouted in alarm, and those Ed could still see backed away quickly, but the smoke washed forward like a grey wall, swallowing anything in its midst.

It was heading straight for the fountain, a ridiculously enormous ceremonial structure in the middle of the lawn. The smoke was too thick to see anything, but Ed distantly heard splashing and something that sounded suspiciously like, "Never been so happy to be soaking wet..."

The Beast had stopped, huddling indecisively next to the fountain. There were shouts, and Ed turned to see several of the firemen struggling with the fire hose.

"The other one was on before the Beast came," Ed murmured to himself. "Turn it off!" he shouted, ignoring the fact that he had no authority here. "Turn it off, come up behind it, and then turn the water back on. You have to corral it into the stadium."

One of the men hurried to the hydrant to switch the water off. "Brother!" Al said, and Ed spun around to see the orange-gray smog rushing at him again. Before he could move, ashes and debris once again invaded his senses, making him choke. He thought he heard footsteps running away—was that Al? No, there were too many—and he blinked his eyes against the smoke, backing away instinctively until someone ran into him.

No. It was some_thing. _Something large and solid, and it knocked him roughly onto his back.

There was a groan of pain to his left—_that _was Al, right there—and then the air rose to a boil around him, and something hairy snorted and sniffed just above him, brushing against him in hot bursts that felt like they burned through his skin. Ed yelped in pain, gasping and choking in the grey air, his head throbbing and his thoughts becoming hazy.

Through the haze came an odd, familiar feeling, a warmth that had nothing to do with the fire on his skin, but something that Ed's clouded mind couldn't quite place. The Pyro panted, its hot breath steaming over Ed once, twice. Then it moved past him. Ed could feel its heat recede in the distance. A few moments later, the smoke receded as well, followed by the shouts and footsteps of the firemen.

He coughed, his eyes tearing up from the ashes. Wiping a hand angrily across his face, he sat up. The world spun. His skin still felt tender and warm, not quite burned, but something close to it.

Dimly, he became aware of a presence next to him. He turned to see Al lying a few feet away, and instinctively dragged himself closer.

"Al?" His brother was completely covered in dark soot, and he exhaled hard as Ed helped him sit up. "You okay?"

"I think so," Al said. "But my arm…" he clutched it to his chest. "I fell on it when it ran into us."

As one, they turned to the stadium. It appeared that the smoke was between the wide doors of the gate, but they couldn't be quite sure. Ed felt the need to get up, to make sure that they'd succeeded, but as he moved, he began coughing again. Al pulled him back down with his good arm.

"You'll be of no use to anyone if you hack out a lung, Brother," Al said quietly.

"Yeah, I know," Ed said wearily, dissolving into another fit of coughs. Trying to stand so quickly had made the world tilt the wrong way, and his head had not stopped throbbing. He swore he could hear a pattering noise, and then he realized that someone was running toward them.

"Paramedics," a blond man said, without preamble. "We're here to help."

"Joy," Ed said dimly, realizing where this would lead and not relishing the idea of a stay in the hospital. He thought he heard Al begin chastising him, but couldn't quite make out what his brother was saying. The fair-haired man helped Ed up and put something over his face. A breathing mask, he realized. And there was suddenly an emergency van nearby for him to lean against, or maybe it had been there before…

Al was looking at him in concern from where they now sat in the rear of the vehicle, and Ed had the presence of mind to take the mask off for a moment and flash his brother a wordless grin. Al smiled back, a half-exasperated _what-can-you-do _look.

"Aren't you two a pair?" a voice said from over Ed's shoulder. He jumped, cursing under his breath at the fog in his mind.

Mustang stood there, his trademark smirk pasted across his face. Much to Ed's chagrin, he had somehow gotten away with only a smattering of soot on his uniform. The others, who trailed behind him, had fared similarly well. "How did you manage to end up like this? _I'm _the one it was chasing, after all."

"Fuck off, Mustang," Ed said. It might have had more bite if he hadn't wheezed the words out. Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw Mustang blink, looking almost concerned.

The blond paramedic, who had been checking Al's arm, looked up. "We'll need to bring you both in," he said authoritatively. Ed might have protested, except that he could see how tired his brother looked and felt that it was probably reflected in his own face.

Ed broke into another series of coughs as someone began speaking. Havoc and Breda moved forward to get Al into the van, where they laid him down. Then Ed was helped up again, but this time he was laid down onto something springy—a stretcher, maybe?—but his head started to spin again as he moved. By the time they'd laid him down in the car, right across from Al, he had already started to fade.

"Rest, Fullmetal," someone said. Ed's face split into a wide yawn and he slipped into dreams of swirling grey ash.

.

.

.

**A/N: **Trivia Question: I did not actually invent the Pyro myself. I stole it from a story and renamed it. Anyone know where the not-Pyro comes from? If you answer correctly you get…well, bragging rights! (Yay!)

Thanks for dropping by. Please leave a review on your way out!

~ket

**Next Chapter: **In Which Edward May or May Not Throw a (Sophisticated) Temper Tantrum


	6. In Which Edward May or May Not Throw

**.:Six:.**

**In Which Edward May or May Not Throw a (Sophisticated) Temper Tantrum**

.

It was mind-numbingly cold. White flakes swirled in a frosty gray haze, and Edward hunched himself against the harsh winds, his footsteps thumping forward through fresh snow.

At the moment, he was trundling through an evergreen forest, but he knew it wouldn't be that way for long. Not in this fickle landscape. He'd rarely been to this area of the gate before; the Beasts in this section were cruel and unpredictable.

Out of the grey storm came flashes of red and sparks of fire. Something in the distance roared loudly, and Ed thought he heard Mustang's voice before it was extinguished by the snorts and snuffles of the Beast. The air warmed, heating his flesh until it burned. Ed groaned aloud, his world overtaken by fire and then by lightning, lightning that gripped him with the Gatekeepers' little fingers, lightning that stung with the power of alchemy, lightning that wouldn't let go. He couldn't breathe.

The world turned blindingly white before his eyes, the Gate changing shape almost instantly. But it wasn't the Gate. It was the hospital. Memories floated back to Ed slowly, but the pain from his dreams didn't go away. There was an odd pressure on his face. He coughed, turning wearily to see his brother sitting in a chair next to his bed, a book in his hands.

Al's eyes lit up. "Brother! How are you feeling?"

"Like a monster ran me over," Ed grumbled. His voice was muffled, and Ed noticed for the first time that there was a clear mask around his mouth. He pulled it off, struggling to sit up.

"Ah—Brother, you shouldn't do that."

Ed winced as his skin protested his movements. "What—"

"The doctor said you'll have bruises for a while, from the Beast…" Al trailed off as Ed lifted his shirt to see a dark purple mark across his chest. From the way his arm and thigh smarted, he assumed he'd find something similar if he looked there as well.

He glanced at Al, whose forehead was lightly bandaged. His arm was firmly wrapped in a splint. "Al! You're hurt!" he said.

Al followed his brother's gaze and smiled again. "It's not really broken, just a small fracture," he assured Ed. "I'm fine, Brother."

Ed nodded slowly, coughing again, but he couldn't look away from his brother, whose health had never been a problem before. Ed couldn't remember the last time that he had worried about dragging Al along beside him, but now a nagging fear settled in the back of his mind based on the notion that Al could now be hurt more seriously than bandages could help.

"Besides," Al continued after a moment, "you were much worse off, Brother. I was worried about you."

"I'm fine now," he said, as a nurse poked her head into the open door.

"I thought I heard talking," she said amiably. "I'll have the doctor come by in a second." She barely gave Al enough time to thank her before she vanished.

"What time is it?" Ed asked. "What happened?"

"It's a little after two," Al said, frowning. "You've only been asleep for a few hours. Everyone else is alright. The Pyro is locked away in the stadium—Mustang snuck out through one of the side doors." He paused, thinking. "They said he did an emergency press conference, too. About two hours ago, I think. People were starting to worry, and I'm not sure what he said to calm them down…"

"He's got a silver tongue," Ed said, without bite. "I'm sure he thought of something."

A few moments later, the doctor stepped in, a smile stretching across his freckled face as he rattled off their list of injuries: a hairline fracture to Al's arm and a deep scratch to his head, three cracked ribs and a heavy dose of smoke inhalation for Ed, and a smattering of scrapes and bruises for both of them.

"It's fairly normal to experience shortness of breath after what you've experienced," the doctor explained in a gravelly tone as he pressed his cold stethoscope to Ed's chest. "We've kept you on oxygen while you were asleep—take a deep breath for me—and your lungs are still healing, Edward. You need to be sure to take good care of them. _You're _free to leave if you'd like, Alphonse, but we'll be keeping your brother for an additional twenty-four hours for rest and observation—" he said, pausing as Ed snorted in amusement.

"I'd like to see you try," he said with a brazen grin.

The doctor's youthful face sobered. "I've been told that you have the habit of being reckless with your health, so I must warn you that if you're not careful, there's always the chance of permanent lung damage…" he said quietly.

"I'll be fine," Ed said, but Al caught his attention. He had that gleam in his eye, and the expression on his face reminded Ed of the one their mother donned when she was dead set on getting her way. It was a flat, no-nonsense sort of thing.

"He'll stay," Al contradicted.

"Good to hear," said the doctor, flipping the papers back onto his clipboard in a single, fluid movement. His face brightened again. "Take care of your body and it will take care of you, Edward!" he chirped as his disappeared into the hallway.

"What a creep," Ed muttered to himself. He turned to Al, who pinned him with an icy stare. "What?"

"Really, Brother. No running off, alright? You just came back from the Gate, and I don't want to lose you so quickly."

"Al_right, _Al," Ed said, sinking back into his pillows. He took a slow, rattling breath. Not that he'd admit it, but his body still felt weighed down and weary, and he wasn't in a huge hurry to leave his bed, for once. Al probably noticed this—he always did—because he, too, sat back with a satisfied look on his face. "Anyway, have you heard from Mustang at all? What's going on now?"

His brother shook his head. "He asked to be notified when you woke. I haven't heard anything new, except that one of the nurses was talking about the press conference she heard on the radio."

Ed grunted. He felt it unlikely that the Beasts had paused their attacks while he was asleep. "Not sure I trust that Bastard to figure things out on his own."

Al gave a halfhearted protest against Ed's perpetual nickname for the Brigadier-General, then sighed. "I would have gone myself if I thought it would help," he said. "But you looked so terrible I could hardly leave." He paused. "Besides, without alchemy, I don't think it would be of much use to them."

The heating unit hummed to life above them. Ed stretched his arms above his head and looked around the sterile room, already sinking into boredom. His brother adjusted himself in the uncomfortable-looking wooden chair, shifting his book to his good arm.

"What's that?" Ed coughed, tilting his head to look at the pages in Al's hands. Al followed his brother's gaze.

"Oh, I've been…researching," he said, sheepishly. For the first time, Ed noticed that there was a pile of books stacked up on the bedside table. "I went to the library for a bit to grab some books."

"Books about what?" Ed asked curiously.

"Different creation theories, some alchemical histories...it seems like all of this," he waved his hand, and Ed's mind leapt to understand that he probably meant the Beasts and their accompanying natural disasters, "used to be normal. At least, according to at least five different creation stories. The Beasts were just thought of as spirits back then, though. People sacrificed food and animals to try and appease them, but nothing worked.

"They could fight a lot more easily, though, because they could do alchemy without the rule of equivalent exchange. The alchemy was inside of them somehow—" he shook his head as he watched Ed's eyebrows rise "—but the texts aren't really clear on that part. What I _do _know is that they sacrificed their alchemy to make the Gate, which they called the spirit realm. It was meant as a completely closed system, somewhere that alchemy and the Beasts were trapped so that people could live their lives freely."

"But…?"

"_But _people started realizing that there were ways to work around the system. They started developing different alchemical arrays, which initially allowed them to do alchemy again without risking destruction from the Beasts."

"So, the Beasts were completely sealed off, and there was no equivalent exchange? They could just use alchemy however they wanted?"

"For a while. But when they created the Gate, its primary purpose was to keep all alchemical energy—including the Beasts—safely inside of it. The best guess that we can make is that the Gate somehow…evolved."

"_Evolved?_" Ed parroted. "How could it evolve? It's based on an array."

"I'm not sure, Brother. But alchemy is a form of energy, and maybe…I don't know. Maybe it just started working to fulfill its duty to the best of its ability. At any rate, it created an exchange rate. Equivalent exchange. Which," Al granted, resting his head on his hand, "wasn't really equivalent at all. It was subjective, according to what the Gate thought was proper."

A pause. "An imperfect system," Ed murmured, "but it worked. For centuries."

Al nodded. "Until now."

"Right," Ed said, suddenly annoyed. "And now we have to figure out how to get it back. How to recreate a whole alternate plane—"

"Not exactly," Al interrupted. "The plane should still be there, just empty. We just need to recreate the _gate _part of the Gate. The mechanism that keeps everything _in _the plane."

"And how are we supposed to do that?" Ed asked, not really expecting an answer.

Al gave one anyway. "I'm not sure," He sighed. "Even _with _the ability to use alchemy, the cost would be huge. And we don't even know where to start as far as the array goes…"

The expression on Al's face became gloomy. "We'll figure something out," Ed reassured him, though the _probably _and _eventually _remained unspoken. Until then, they'd be forced to dodge Beasts and brave the elements until an answer came. But there was something in Ed's mind, some spark that refused to let him believe that the answer wouldn't appear.

"Excuse me, Mr. Elric?"

"Yes?" Al and Ed chorused instinctively.

The nurse who had appeared in the doorway cleared her throat. "Mr. _Edward _Elric. You have a phone call at the front desk. Normally, you'd be able to take it here in the room, but the power has been in and out, and the generators can only take so much…"

"It's fine," Ed coughed, swinging his legs over the side of the bed. Al stood without being asked, and his eyes dared Ed to object. "Lead the way."

She led them through the maze of hallways. The hospital was a madhouse due to recent events, and the familiar buzz of movement was only magnified by the sheer number of stretchers being carried and the feeling of urgency. Al remained close enough to Ed's side to catch him if he stumbled but not close enough that it felt like hovering.

They reached the nurse's station. The woman pressed a few buttons on the phone, and Ed pushed a few coughs out of his system before he took the phone from her.

"Hello?"

"Fullmetal?" It was Mustang. Ed could hardly hear him over the bustle and noise that came through as well. "How are you feeling?"

For a moment, Ed was taken aback by the concern. "What?"

"How are you feeling?" The voice was more deliberate this time, as though speaking to a child. "It's not a hard question. The doctor told me the smoke inhalation was severe. And you've broken your ribs?"

_Seriously, _thought Ed, irritated, _do they have to exaggerate so much? It's not like I'm dying._

"I'm _fine, _Mustang," he growled. He cleared his throat, which still felt dry and tasted of ash. "Anyway, I hear you put the Pyro away."

"We did, but there's more where that came from." Ed became aware of the sound of shouting in the background, and he pressed his ear into the phone to hear better before Mustang continued. "It's these little black ones," he said, "the ones with the creepy grins. We're in Tobha. There was a mudslide that buried half the place. We're trying to get people out safely, digging through the rubble, but these little—" he broke off, cursing, and Ed heard gunshots. "They've been tripping anyone trying to escape, flinging mud back where we've been digging people out. They're even pushing over buildings—you'd think they're too small, but with enough of them—"

"Mustang, calm down," Ed warned. "You're giving them what they want."

"If I still had alchemy, I would have fried them hours ago," his commanding officer snarled.

"They're not dangerous," Ed insisted.

"You said that the last time!"

"Yeah," Ed agreed, rolling his eyes, "but that was before I knew it was going to fall in love with _you_. Look, there's no way to contain the Keepers. There's too many of them. Besides, they're only curious. Deal with the Keepers like little children," he suggested. "You just give them a distraction and ignore them until they go away."

There was a pause on the other line. "That's your philosophy on child care?"

"_Mustang,_" Ed growled.

"Alright, alright. A distraction."

Ed coughed, thinking quickly. "Build a fire," he said after a moment. He had hardly spoken the words before he heard Mustang's muffled voice relaying the order to some of his men. He waited impatiently, watching Al drum his fingers on the desk beside him.

"Hope this works, Fullmetal," Mustang said into the phone. "Because if we have to try to cage _all _of the Beasts, we'll start running out of places to stash them all."

"It'll work," Ed said confidently. Then he quickly added, "and I can help with the others, too. I can be to Tobha in a few hours," he said, ignoring his brother's raised eyebrows.

"No, Ed," Mustang said firmly. "You're still recovering. And the last thing we need is for you get seriously hurt on the job—"

"I'm _fine,_" Ed protested, annoyed, "They've checked me out—"

"—and I've already heard about the twenty-four hour resting period. You're meant to be doing research. You and Al are our best bets for figuring out how to deal with this mess in the long term."

"We can't do research if we're stuck here in the hospital anyway!"

"But that's where you'll be doing it. Do _not _leave the hospital until the doctors let you," Mustang said.

"Is that an order?" Ed snarled.

"You looked like shit the last time I saw you, Fullmetal," Mustang said flatly. "Stay where you are."

A click signaled the end of the conversation, and Ed slammed the phone into the receiver, swearing to himself. "It's for the best, Brother," Al said easily after a moment, having caught the gist of the conversation. "We need to figure out what to do more than anything else, and we can work from here."

"I know that," Ed grumbled. "But that doesn't mean he has to order me around and treat me like a child."

"I half-thought you and Brigadier-General Mustang would get along a bit better after a year of separation," Al said to himself, staring at the ceiling. "I don't know why I thought that."

"Me neither," Ed barked crossly. "Let's get back to the room."

.

Something about a full stomach always put Ed in a better mood. Or maybe it was because it had been such a long time since he'd had some of the foods. As he wolfed down his first warm roll of bread in a year, he felt decidedly better about the whole situation. Hell, even hospital food was an improvement over what he was used to, which was nothing at all.

Al watched him in amusement as he picked at his own meal, which had presumably been provided because even though he was technically discharged, they were the Elric brothers, after all.

As one of the nurses bustled in to give Ed another once-over, Al brought up the problem of the Gate once more.

"Whether or not we actually find a way to harness all the alchemy, we'll need to recreate the Gate. I might know where to find the array—or maybe arrays—to help."

Ed moved so that the nurse could check his pulse. "What do you mean? Those things would have been made centuries ago. Millennia, even. How could they have survived?"

Al shuffled through his pile of textbooks, drawing an aged brown one form the stack. "Most of the books only discuss the necessary arrays vaguely," he said as he flipped through the pages, "and it's difficult to draw such a complicated array in such a small book."

"Right," Ed realized. "With all of the required elemental tiers, it must have been huge."

"Exactly," Al agreed. "_This _author has tried to detail some of the bits and pieces of it, but…" he trailed off, pushing the book toward his brother. As he turned the pages, Ed could see that many of the pages were faded and worn, and a few were partially or completely ripped away. "With only this, it's impossible to see which pieces fit where, or how much is missing."

"Well, where did _he _find the information?" Ed asked, coughing and rubbing his sore throat. He began flipping through the pages again, waving the nurse off as she tried to get him to lie back down in bed.

"Well," Al said slowly, gently prying the book back from Ed's hands and flipping to the first few pages. "The introduction of the book mentioned…" he paused, reading. "It looks like these are copied from a series of famous cave paintings just outside of Senna…and…researchers travel there to study some of the primitive arrays. But some of them—like this one—are extremely complex." He looked up at Ed. "Which means that most of the studies probably end up being pure conjecture."

Ed paused to let that sink in. "We need to go there," he said quietly.

"It would help," Al agreed warily. "But in the meantime—"

"I'm signing out AMA," he said flatly. This was directed at the nurse, but when he looked up, he realized that she must have left.

"Brother," Al groaned in exasperation, "you know you're meant to stay put. We still need to research to figure out where we're even going to _get _the alchemy from. These arrays are useless if we can't power them. You know that."

"How much work are we actually going to get done here in the hospital?" Ed asked. "If we're stuck here without access to a library—"

"They could _bring _the books to us, Brother," Al said. Ed shot him a look, knowing that Al felt the same as he did: it was nearly impossible for them to research without being able to browse entire sections, to really put their hands on the books, to decide for themselves which ideas were worth pursuing. "Alright," Al conceded, "that's never really worked for us before."

"No, it hasn't," Ed agreed. "Al, it's not like we're going to be fighting or anything. We just need to take a train and sit in a cave for a while to look at the arrays. Nothing dangerous."

Al hesitated. "Still, I don't think that the Brigadier-General—"

"We can _go_ if we want," Ed said haughtily. "There's no need for Mustang to check in again if he thinks we're under lock and key for the next twenty-four hours under his _orders_."

"Brother," Al said, "you know that's not what he meant. He's just worried, that's all."

"Mustang can kiss my ass. Besides, we're researching, just like he wanted. We're just not doing it in a stuffy hospital ward."

Al huffed, running a hand through his hair. "You're just throwing a temper tantrum," he argued, voice rising a bit. "If the Brigadier-General hadn't forbidden you to leave—"

"We'd still be going anyway," Ed said.

His brother sighed, but Ed knew he felt the same. "It could be dangerous if we run into Beasts out there, Brother," Al chided.

"Yeah, but it's dangerous anywhere," Ed said seriously. "It's not like the Beasts will leave us alone just because we're in a hospital."

Al hummed, and Ed knew he could see the logic in _that, _at least. "Alright, Brother," he said finally. "But when the Brigadier-General comes to kill you this time, I might just step aside and let him do it.

.

.

.

**A/N: **Slow chapter, I know. But look on the bright side: both Ed and Mustang are back to normal. For those of you interested, the Pyro comes from Roald Dahl's fabulous and peculiar short story "The Minpins," although there it's a monster called "the Gruncher." The story is meant for kids, but it's a great read if you can get your hands on a copy, especially if you're a fan of Dahl!

Thanks to everyone who reviewed! It's awesome to hear from you all. I hope you enjoyed this chapter as well, and feel free to drop me a line and let me know what you thought!

~ket

**Next Chapter: **A Wild Mirkworm Appears! Ed Uses Sarcasm! It's Not Very Effective…


	7. A Wild Mirkworm Appears! Ed Uses Sarcasm

**.:Seven:.**

**A Wild Mirkworm Appears! Edward Uses Sarcasm! It's Not Very Effective…**

.

Ed stumbled from the bus and pulled his coat closed against the autumn chill. He was grateful that they'd had very little luggage—Al had scrounged up a bag in which they put two of the alchemy textbooks and a spare change of clothes each—because the warmth of the vehicle and the afternoon sun had lulled him into lethargy, and he was only now beginning to shake it off.

He started trudging downhill, glancing back at the bus as Al fell into step beside him. "That wasn't such a bad ride," he said through a wide yawn. A year ago, Ed never would have thought that he'd look forward to long voyages, but there was something comforting about the familiar worn seats, the weary passengers, the cramped spaces. He wouldn't admit it to anyone, but he'd missed this form of travel—landscapes flickering past with Al at his side. Trains and buses were almost a second home to them.

Al hummed in agreement as they followed the unpaved trail. Ed's yawn turned into a series of coughs, and he ignored the look of concern his brother gave him. The area around them was heavily forested, spiking into tall peaks in the distance to their right. "It's this way, Brother," Al said absently, pulling his brother to the left toward a sloping foot trail that descended into the woods.

"Are you sure?" Ed asked, but he turned to follow his brother all the same.

"I went this way last time," Al confirmed.

Ed frowned. "I don't remember being here before."

"I came here alone," Al said gently, "when you were gone. It's a small place, but their library has information that you can't find anywhere else."

"What kind of information?" Ed asked warily, kicking the dry leaves.

"About the Gate," Al clarified. "I wasn't doing anything dangerous, Brother, or going after the philosopher's stone. I just thought that there might have been some kind of loophole. A weakness in the Gate that I could…" he trailed off, brow furrowing. "Anyway, I didn't find anything much."

Al smiled weakly and turned away. It was hard to remember that he'd spent so much time on his own, that he'd lived and done things Ed didn't know about…suddenly, Ed wondered what Al had done all that time, where he had wandered in search of answers.

"Anyway," Al said after a moment, before Ed could figure out what to ask, "it's a nice place. Small and out of the way, like Risembool, with little neighborhoods where everyone knows everyone else. You can pass by without even realizing it's there." He looked around wistfully at the gnarled trees that lined the path and twisted above their heads. "And sometimes, it's nice to just spend time in the forest. You could stay in here for ages...oh! Look, Brother, we're almost there. I can see the chimney smoke."

Sure enough, they cleared the tree line a few minutes later and found themselves in the valley, where buildings were scattered up and down the slanted land and half-hidden behind clusters of trees.

Ed could see how the village would have charmed his brother; it made for a beautiful setting in the late afternoon light, with its quaint wooden houses, stream that babbled downhill toward an ancient stone grist mill, and foliage that was just changing colors for the fall. But there was something unnerving about it.

"Is it always this quiet?" Ed asked his brother. Aside from a few women hanging clothes to dry and a lone farmer, the town appeared deserted.

Al led the way, following the worn trail around houses and thickets alike and weaving a path to the inn. "No," he murmured thoughtfully. "It seemed busier last time I was here."

"I guess news of the Beasts has even reached here too," Ed said. "If they haven't made it here themselves."

The innkeeper, who introduced herself as Nora, greeted them as they entered the building. "Need a room?" she asked, smiling in spite of her businesslike tone.

"Just for the night," Ed agreed. "We'll be catching the bus back tomorrow."

Nora nodded and scribbled into a notebook on the desk, her short, greying hair falling into her face. She looked up and studied them for a moment, before deciding, "You're here for the caves."

"How did you know?" Al asked

She beamed at them, dimples pocketing her cheeks. "Most everyone comes here for the caves. You could say they're the main attraction around here. Though most people stay for more than just the one night…" She hesitated. "Not that I'm—! Well, I'm glad of the business, anyway. Haven't had our share of travelers lately, what with talk of those monsters spreading all over. Some say the world's ending; me, I think it's just a hiccup that's bad for business."

Ed, struck by her cavalier tone, couldn't help but ask, "Have there been any attacks here?"

"Just a few," she said, wiping her hands on her apron and motioning for them to follow. "But I wouldn't really call them attacks. The monsters we've got are just tiny ones compared to what you hear about on the radio." She stopped in the hallway, handing them two keys. "Here's your room. You heading out right away? I'll give you a few pointers," she added with a wink.

"Sure," Ed agreed easily, suppressing a cough as he dropped their single bag over the threshold and pocketing his key. "What can you tell us?"

"Well," Nora began, walking over to rummage through a nearby closet, "people come from all over to see the paintings. Alchemists, historians, artists, researchers…but I like to give people a few words about the caves before they just dive right in." She pulled out a stack of papers and peeled one off the top. A map. She handed it to Al. "The paintings are easy enough to reach, and the caves aren't too dangerous, but we have our fair share of accidents. And this place is so out of the way that accidents can turn serious real fast, if you catch my drift. We've got a few people good at healing, but if there's a real emergency, the nearest hospital is over in Fotcett, 'bout an hour away by bus. Things don't—"

There was a long, rough howl from somewhere outside, followed by another. The brothers froze, but Nora shoved the papers back into the closet and bustled down the hall, slamming the windows and doors shut.

"What is that?" Al asked, peering out the windows. Ed thought he already knew.

"Those monsters." Nora called back. "Look, they're over here." She pointed at a window across from the front desk, where a pair of brown-haired beasts trundled, their enormous, jagged teeth glinting in the dying sunlight.

"What _is _that?" Al asked again.

"Howlers," Ed said quietly.

"Where—do they even have eyes?"

"Not sure."

"S'alright," Nora said softly, leaning against the window. "They don't eat people, anyway. Not that we've noticed," she said wryly. "They only eat _those _monsters."

Ed noticed the black Gatekeepers for the first time, writhing up the side of a tree and shrieking loudly.

"Not that we were sad to see the little ones go," Nora said. "But something about the teeth rattles most of us, even though that fool Tamry over at the mill went up to pet one. Everyone else's been keeping indoors when they're around—_oh!_"

They watched as one of the Howlers spurted forward suddenly, snakelike, catching a Keeper in its massive jaw. The black Beast disappeared down the Howler's throat with a whimper, and something about it made Ed jolt, a strange sensation that he'd felt before, with the Pyro, and that made his skin shiver. Something he couldn't place, a word on the tip of his tongue.

After a few moments of musing, he became aware that he stood at the window alone. Nora and Al had pulled themselves away from the window and were chattering away. Nora had gathered the tools that she was lending them: lanterns, a map, and water canteens. Al shoved them into his pack, along with the alchemy book and their notebooks.

"Are the two of you sure you want to head out?" Nora fretted as Ed approached, wiping her hands anxiously on her apron again. "There might be trouble for you if you do."

"It'll be fine," Ed assured her. "We'll stay as far away from those things as we can get."

Nora shook her head and gestured toward the window. "Those ones out there are one thing, but I've been hearing horrible things on the radio."

"We'd better get going before it gets too dark, brother," Al said calmly. Despite his initial worries, he seemed willing enough to follow through with this plan now that they had started.

The innkeeper sighed and muttered to herself as they stepped outside, keeping an eye out for the Howlers. "Watch your backs," she called after them.

The sun had dipped below the trees, but there was more than enough light for the pair of them to make their way through the village and into the undergrowth, following a trail that had been worn by the steps of a thousand boots.

As they trundled through the forest, Ed watched the way his brother adjusted the pack, grabbing it only with his good arm. Ed wordlessly plucked the bag from his Al's back and shouldered it himself. "Do we really both need to go in?" Ed asked, silencing Al's protest before he could start. "You're hurt."

"So are you, Brother," Al said patiently. "And I thought we weren't planning on running into trouble?"

"We aren't," Ed confirmed. "But just in case."

"It'll be faster with both of us," Al insisted, "and we need all the information we can get. We may not know _how _to get to the alchemy we need, but knowing what kind of alchemy to use is equally important. First things first, after all."

Ed _hmm_ed. Hecouldn't ignore his brother's logic, and his own footsteps had never slowed or faltered. He hadn't really expected Al to let him off so easily.

.

There were only two entrances into the caves, and the one that Nora had directed them to was a small one. Al lit their oil lanterns at the cave mouth, and they wordlessly stepped down into the darkness of the cave and away from the fading sunlight.

In testament to the frequent visitors, the path down was eased by wooden stairways and strategically placed rocks. The air chilled around them as they descended, as though it were winter instead of fall down here. Ed was grateful for the lanterns as the darkness thickened.

After a five-minute trek, clusters of paintings began to litter the wall to their right, growing closer together as they moved on and branching off into the adjoining tunnels. Ed glanced at them when he was not watching his footing: horses, humans, primitive weapons, shelters, and strange beings that could only have been the spirits, which they now called Beasts.

The way forward branched off again. Al checked the map before leading them down a passage that narrowed and dropped into a slant. The ceiling lowered, and they hunched over a little to make their way. Just as Ed was beginning to feel claustrophobic, they stepped out into an enormous chamber that stretched twenty feet above their heads and farther to their right than the lantern light could reach.

"It's beautiful," Al said in a hushed voice, as though he was afraid to disturb the air. In the light of his raised lantern, the walls glowed and flickered with surreal brightness. Stalactites glimmered on the ceiling, hanging like teeth, and water trickled somewhere off in the distance.

But the most beautiful things were the arrays painted on the far walls, dancing across the surface in vivid colors and spirals as though someone thought that these arrays, too, should be considered artwork. The Elrics stepped forward, boots treading through puddles of water, as both of them moved their lanterns to see as much of the designs as possible.

"It's this one, here," Ed said quietly, recognizing a giant array that stretched fifteen feet at least. "It's the one from the book."

"And this one," Al said after a moment, finding another nearby. "And…this small one has some of the same designs…"

"It would have had to be huge," Ed remembered. "Does that mean that…?"

"—that it doesn't fit on the wall?" Al finished. "We're meant to piece them together on our own, I think."

The silent cave swallowed up their words as they both pondered that for a minute.

"Alright," Ed said finally, "let's get started."

.

They spent the next eternity settled down onto the driest part of the cave floor, staring in silence and scribbling into the notebooks now and then as they began to recognize the sigils of the elements, of time, of renewal. The designs were balanced and firm in a manner that was not at all apparent in the books, and the designs spoke to each other in a way that would only be truly understandable once they were combined into a single array.

It was trying work that evolved past their idea of simply copying bits of the array; the pair of them became engrossed in intertwining the designs, in fitting them together. A good portion of the time was spent simply staring, fitting sigils together like puzzle pieces in their minds.

Ed wasn't sure how much time had passed when he broke away from his task, arrays still dancing before his eyes. Hours, if the stiffness in his back and legs was anything to go by.

Al worked dutifully beside him, grasping his notebook as his eyes flickered from one design to the next. But something had broken Ed's concentration, something nearby. It was the same feeling he'd had earlier, the strange and flickering feeling that made his skin shiver.

He realized what it was.

"Al," he said suddenly, "we gotta move."

"What?" His brother blinked as though waking from sleep. "Where?"

"There's something in here—a Beast. We need to get out of here."

"What—how do you know?" Al asked, although he began shoving their things back into the pack and squinting into the darkness that the lantern light could not touch.

"I can feel the alchemy," Ed said.

Al paused, pinning his brother with a startled gaze as they rose to their feet. "You can _feel _it? You didn't think to mention that before, Brother?" he hissed.

"Well, I just—it never came up!" Ed said defensively, as the prickling of his skin grew stronger.

"Never came—!"

Ed grabbed his brother by the arm and began dragging him away, further into the caves. The strange feeling of alchemy, the alchemy that now belonged to the Beasts, was emanating from the way that they had come.

They staggered deeper into the tunnels, stumbling across the slippery surfaces and holding their lanterns up as well as possible. Any doubts Ed had had about his own sanity disappeared as they began to hear faint slithering sounds that came from the narrow tunnels behind them.

"Do you at least know what it is?" Al panted as they hugged the wall.

"Working on it," Ed threw out, though he had his suspicions. "Just what we fucking needed," he grumbled to himself. "Like we didn't have enough fun with monsters already."

The path below their feet was slanting downward once more, and suddenly they slid into icy, ankle-deep water. They stopped cold. "The river," Al breathed.

Nora had explained that some of the oldest cave paintings were accessible only at certain parts of the year, when the water was low. Unless you brought a boat. Ed grabbed his brother and pulled him forward. "We don't have any other option," he said, and added, "and I don't think it will be able to follow very well in here."

They pressed on. The icy water filled Ed's boots, gradually rising past his hips to almost swallow his shoulders as the floor slanted unevenly beneath their feet. With the lanterns and pack above their heads, they stayed close to the wall, where the floor was highest. If it got much deeper…

The current was weak, though it lazily pulled them onward. Al nearly lost his footing as he hurried forward; Ed threw out a hand to steady him. "Not so fast. I think it's following by the sound," he said. They waded as quickly and silently as possible as they pressed on.

When the sound of splashes reached their ears, Ed risked a glance behind him. In the dim light, almost outside of the realm of his lantern's glow, was a creature Ed knew as a Mirkworm. Its long, pale body was covered in dark moss and fungus, and as it thrashed about ineffectively in the deep water, Ed noticed with a shudder that its yawning mouth was still more than wide enough for a human to fit through.

The creature backed up awkwardly, thwarted by the deeper water. It retreated little by little, slipping out of the water and back into the tunnel behind them. Its head peered in their direction—_maybe not_, Ed thought, since he was fairly sure it was blind—and it noiselessly disappeared into the darkness.

"That's right," Ed growled to himself. "Get out of here, you stinking earthworm."

They continued wading slowly rough the water, the light from the lanterns glimmering off the surface of the water as they strained their ears for any sound other than the distant dripping of water.

After a few minutes, they came to an uneven patch of ground that rose sharply. When they stood on it, the freezing water only reached their knees. Al fumbled for the map, which was soggy in one corner, as Ed began to wring water from the bottom of his braid.

"Where are we?" he asked, still shivering from the cold. He knew from studying the map that the cave system was extensive. It might take a day's travel by foot to reach the opposite end where the river flowed out, unless they found one of the smaller side exits. And as wet and cold as they were, hunted by a Beast at their backs, it would be a long and miserable journey.

Al didn't answer right away, holding the lantern steady as his eyes darted around the paper. "I think we're here," he said triumphantly after a minute, lowering the light a bit to jab at the paper. "So…there's an exit ahead—I can't tell how far." He scoured the darkness before them, lifting his lantern to see. "Come on. Let's get out of here, Brother."

"What I wouldn't give for a change of clothes," Ed muttered to himself, shaking water from his icy, drenched coat.

They trudged forward, the water receding until they splashed onto slick earth once more. Al navigated their way through the adjoining tunnels. By now, though, his hands were shaking from the cold, and the lantern light danced wildly on the walls. Ed's skin prickled again as well, but not from the cold.

He spurted forward, but he barely had time to call out before the Beast slammed into Al from somewhere above, crushing him hard against the wall before careening sideways. Al crashed to the cavern floor, his lantern shattering beside him and flickering out on the wet ground.

Panicking, Ed rushed to his dazed brother, hoisting him up by the front of his shirt and propping him against his shoulder. "Walk, Al!" he commanded, throwing an arm around his back as he quickly staggered forward. Behind them, the Mirkworm seemed stunned from the blow; it was moving slowly, brushing against the walls as though to get its bearings.

The ground began a steep rise below their feet, and Ed half-dragged his brother uphill, slipping on the slimy ground and trying to manage Al and the lantern at once. Ed could hear the Beast, feel it behind them as they stumbled again.

"There," Al murmured weakly. Ed's eyes flickered around, looking for what his brother meant, when he saw a narrow hole twenty feet away from them on the right side of the wall.

"The exit?" He felt Al nod.

"'Bout time," Ed huffed, doubling his efforts. The wet floor did them no favors. It sloped upward still, like a ramp leading to the exit, and the wall to their left disappeared suddenly, the ground falling away in a steep drop.

A feeling of energy rushed toward them, alchemy strong enough to make Ed's skin prickle and the hair on his neck rise. Ed pivoted to do—something—as the Beast rolled forward, toothless mouth opening wide.

He slid to the side, pulling Al after him as the Mirkworm fumbled blindly forward. Ed caught a whiff of its breath, of decay and rot, as it rolled past. "Awesome," Ed choked, and once he started coughing, he couldn't stop. He struggled for breath as the Beast thrashed around with its gaping mouth, sweeping the pair of them to the side. Ed lost his footing, stumbling backward and gasping for air. Al weakly struggled to keep them both upright.

The Beast had gotten its bearings now that it had blindly knocked into its prey, and it pivoted quickly, blocking the exit.

"You're in the way, you fucking slug," Ed panted, mind racing as he steadied himself, adjusting his grip on his brother.

The Mirkworm spurted toward them, and Ed danced to the side again. This time, he stumbled, his lantern crashing into the Beast's thick skin. Terror flashed briefly in his mind as he processed the prospect of being alone with the creature in total darkness, but the flame did not fade. Instead, it sparked brightly, igniting on the moss and mold that covered the Mirkworm's back.

The creature soundlessly began thrashing and writhing against the fire. Its tail struck Ed, who stumbled away from the exit and into the darkness. Though he tried to keep upright, he lost his footing, and he and Al tumbled backward into the gloom, hitting the solid ground hard.

Ed was dazed for a moment, head swimming and struggling with the inclination to vomit, but he pushed himself up to drag Al out of the way as the flaming Beast began writhing closer. It thrashed into the walls, freeing rocks from the sides and ceiling of the cave, and Ed shoved Al against the wall, sheltering his brother as the stones began raining down in earnest. "What the hell…?" Ed muttered to himself.

Rocks pelted them as the din became almost unbearable, and Ed closed his eyes against the dust and debris that flew everywhere. After half an age, the noise gradually lessened, and Ed chanced a look around them.

In the darkness, he could barely make out a pile of rubble that covered the exit and stretched even to the tunnel they had just come from. Patches of flames were dying among the stones, glimmering against spots of pale flesh that peeked out from underneath the pile. As Ed's eyes adjusted to the dimming light, he realized that pale moonlight was streaming faintly from a few holes in the ceiling.

There was no way out.

"Great!" barked Ed, startling his bleary-eyed brother. "You couldn't just off yourself, you stupid insect. You had to practically take us with you and seal off the fucking…"

After a few beats, he sighed wearily and looked at his brother, who blinked at him confusedly. "Come here," Ed said, running a hand through Al's golden hair and feeling something slick between his fingers. He pulled his hand back, and in the moonlight, he could just make out a dark liquid. He swore softly to himself.

"We're okay?" Al said hazily.

"Yeah," Ed said instantly. "We're both gonna be fine. Lay down, Al."

His brother obediently leaned back onto the slanted earth, breathing shallowly. Ed shook himself, his frustration slowly bleeding away as he checked over his brother, taking inventory of the situation.

They were trapped down here in relative darkness, but they had somehow managed to hang onto their pack with the water canteens and notebooks. They were safe, for the moment. Al was hurt—a concussion, Ed thought from their shared experiences, but he couldn't be sure—and there was not much that could be done to care for him. They were both soaked to the bone and exhausted. But with a bit more light in the morning, they might manage to climb out of the darkness. In any case, Nora knew where they were, and with any luck, they might be found.

He ground out a sigh again, but this one turned into a coughing fit before he could help himself. The day's events caught up with him all at once as the adrenaline ebbed away, and Ed wearily settled onto the ground beside his brother. He ripped a piece of fabric from his shirt and pressed it to the back of his brother's head to stem the blood flow. Al groaned.

"Sorry," Ed murmured. "Try to sleep."

"…you?" Al asked weakly, shivering. Ed pulled his brother's coat closed with one hand.

"I'll sleep in a bit," he said.

Al hummed and fell asleep, just like that.

Ed kept the fabric pressed against Al's hair, watching as the last of the flames flickered out and the stars began to wheel overhead. By the time the bleeding finally slowed and stopped, Ed was numb from the cold. He huddled beside his brother, his drift toward sleep interrupted only by fits of shivering.

Exhaustion finally took its toll, and Ed fell asleep with the comforting feeling of alchemy tugging at his chest.

.

.

.

**A/N: **Poor Ed. He might be a genius, but his ideas don't always work out as smoothly as he hopes. At any rate, he's still alive, and that's what counts!

Not quite sure I'm satisfied with this chapter, but I could go on tweaking it for all of eternity…so I'll let you guys at it. Thanks for tuning in! Please leave me a review, and I'll see you next time!

~ket

_Edit (4/13/12): _A quick note about concussions: it's actually a myth that you shouldn't fall asleep when you have a concussion. Research shows that sleeping can actually be one of the best ways to deal with one. However, it's a good idea to occasionally wake the concussed party to check for additional dizziness, confusion, etc., but otherwise, rest is the best way to heal. This information is accurate to the best of my knowledge, but I'm no doctor, so...yeah. Ed may or may not be alert enough to actually wake Al throughout the night at this point, but there wouldn't be any harm in letting him sleep!

**Next Chapter: **Being an Account of the Near Murder of Edward Elric at the Hands of One Brigadier-General Mustang


	8. Being an Account of the Near Murder

**.:Eight:.**

**Being an Account of the Near Murder of Edward Elric at the Hands of One Brigadier-General Mustang**

.

Somehow, Roy was doing paperwork. Parts of the city were still smoking in the darkness outside his window, and he was at his office signing official documents. Even the apocalypse wouldn't stop bureaucracy. (Hawkeye had assured him that it was still necessary to keep on track with the required documents for the sake of records. Roy told himself that he had only backed down from the argument because she'd pointed her gun at him again, but the stiffness of his aching limbs may have also had something to do with it.)

He tossed the last of the papers off of his desk, sending the pile toppling to the side. He'd regret it in the morning when the time came to clear the floor, but for the moment, he couldn't help but feel a sort of childish glee at the sight of the scattered papers.

It vanished as he rolled his sore shoulders. _Is it really that late? _He thought to himself as he glanced at the night sky outside. Roy barely hesitated before picking up the phone and dialing the number for the hospital. _I'd be surprised if the Elrics _weren't _awake, _he thought dismissively. _Once they get a whiff of new research, they're like dogs with a bone._

The phone rang once, twice. A woman picked up. "Hello?"

"Hello," he said charmingly. "This is Brigadier-General Mustang calling for the Elric brothers. Or rather, I think that Edward is the only one officially still in hospital care."

A pause. "Ah, I think you must be mistaken, sir. The Elrics are no longer here."

Roy refrained from swearing and rubbed at his face wearily. "I was told that they were recommended a twenty-four hour period of rest."

"They were." The sound of shuffling papers. "Mr. Edward Elric signed himself out AMA."

Roy grimaced. He'd known this morning as soon as he got off the phone with Ed that the brothers were no more likely to stay in the hospital for the full resting period than Hawkeye was to let him off easy with his paperwork for the day—even tying Ed's arms to the bed would likely only delay their escape—but he thought they'd spend the night, at least.

Ed and his foolish stubborn streak. Roy knew that Fullmetal would ignore the fact that the Elric brothers had both been worryingly bruised and beaten the last time Roy had seen them. Ed had passed out almost before Roy could finish helping him onto the stretcher. They needed rest.

And Roy had reassured himself that Ed respected his authority and the severity of the situation enough to actually do the research.

Right.

"Sir? Are you still there?"

"Yes—sorry." He sighed. "Well, when did they leave? And did they leave a message? Do you have any idea where they might have gone?"

It was silent on the other line. "I'm sorry sir, but we don't usually release that information, unless—"

"It's protocol in a military hospital to release timestamps—at the very least—to the commanding officer."

A beat. "They signed out at 1:17 p.m. They didn't leave any messages, but they were discussing books, and…it was for some kind of special research, I think, in Senna. They were in a hurry to get out there for some reason."

"In _Senna?_"

"That's what they said."

"I see. Thank you," he said tersely, and hung up the phone.

Fine. They were doing research after all, but they were doing it several hours away from where he'd ordered them to. Roy realized that his hands had already clenched into loose fists, his forefinger close to his thumb, as he was in the habit of doing when he was angry or frustrated. Fine. Ed obviously hadn't realized that he was only sixteen—well, maybe fifteen, if you didn't count whatever had happened during the year of insanity inside the Gate—and that he was too old to be running off like a child anymore.

Fine. It was fine. They were only researching, and would stay out of trouble. Al had the sense that his brother lacked, after all.

Fine. He grabbed his coat and pulled it on, stalking out of his office with a frown deep enough to ward off anyone who got too close.

Fine.

.

Roy slept badly. He got up five hours later with a throbbing headache and headed to the office. The destruction the Beasts were causing had become so problematic that he and his subordinates had hardly slept at all these last few days. They were needed.

The halls of Central were buzzing with frantic activity, and Roy reached his office to discover today's catastrophe: a typhoon had emerged from nowhere and swept through the streets of New Optain, complete with small creatures that could only be Beasts.

"It's been mostly taken care of," Hawkeye explained as she sidled up to him to hand over a report. She and Havoc were rifling through papers again. The bottoms of their uniform pants were still wet. "We had the last shift. We didn't want to wake you before your shift began."

"Hope you don't mind, chief," Havoc said around his cigarette. "I know you would've loved to see it, but I'm sure you'll have your share of excitement as well."

"Have there been any messages?" Roy said tiredly, ignoring the banter.

The pair of them stared back blankly. "Only a thousand, chief," Havoc said finally.

"Anything from the Elrics?" he clarified.

"No, sir," Hawkeye said immediately. "Should there have been?"

"Edward signed out AMA from the hospital."

"Of course he did," Havoc said, grinning to himself. Hawkeye shot him a look.

"And they've taken off for Senna," Roy continued. "For research, presumably, but neither of them bothered to inform me."

Hawkeye sighed. It was a long-suffering thing. "It's a small place, sir," she said. "And if memory serves, there's just the one inn. I'll have the operators get the number." As she spoke, she was already moving to the phone. Havoc stretched and got back to work.

_I don't know why I thought he'd have taken the time to leave a message, but it's the least they could have done, if they _were _going to disobey a direct order, _Roy thought to himself. The sight of the scattered paperwork on the floor of his room only put him in a fouler began stacking the sheets, grumbling quietly.

"Sir?" Hawkeye was holding the phone to him. "It's the innkeeper." Irritated, he walked over to the phone on Hawkeye's desk, intent on giving the Elrics a piece of his mind.

"Hello, this is Brigadier-General Mustang of Central Command. Are there two alchemists registered for a room there? It would be under the name 'Elric.'"

"Those boys? Yes, they've got a room here—" the woman's voice sounded harried.

"Excellent. How may I reach them?"

"You _don't_. That's the thing—haven't seen them since yesterday evening, before nightfall."

Roy paused. "Were you expecting them back?"

"Said they'd only be gone a few hours. They meant to catch the morning train, but it'll be leaving soon, and they've missed the bus to the station—"

"Did they say where they'd gone?"

"They're in the caves. I leant them a pair of lanterns to see by and everything." He could almost hear her frown over the phone. "We don't get many serious accidents, see, so I was thinking maybe it had something to do with…well, everything that's been happening lately."

"Have you sent anyone to search?"

There was a second of silence, and then a breath that sounded as though the woman was trying not to cry. "Normally—" she began, "normally we'd round up a few men for the search. Only no one's too keen to leave the houses, not with…all those creatures. No one's gonna go down there to look. I'd half a mind to go myself, but if anything's happened, I wouldn't be of much use to them…"

"I see," Roy said, mind reeling. He took a moment to gather his thoughts. "Round up some supplies—whatever you gave the Elrics, and whatever you think we might need," he said, ordering her out of habit. "My men and I will be in town as soon as possible to look."

"Got it," she said quietly. "I'll have everything ready."

Roy slowly hung up the phone. Havoc and Hawkeye were looking at him warily.

"Edward and Alphonse are in trouble," he said. The pair of them nodded at once, setting their faces grimly before shouldering their coats.

"Where to?" Havoc asked.

.

When Ed woke for what must have been the millionth time in the past few hours, it was partially because sunlight was now streaming directly onto his face from one of the holes in the cave roof above. His body ached as much as if he hadn't slept at all, and as he wearily reached up to stretch his good arm, he became aware of two things.

The first was that someone was yelling his name, and the voice was familiar.

The second was that he knew how they were going to get their alchemy for the Gate's array.

His hand was frozen in midair as he puzzled through that last one, staring off into space, but his thoughts were interrupted by another shout. That voice…he groaned. _Of course it's Mustang, _he thought, irritable in spite of himself. _Like I need a bigger headache._

"We're—" Ed coughed and cleared his throat, surprised at how hoarse his voice sounded. "_We're down here_!"

"Fullmetal?" The voice was still distant.

"Down here!" He yelled again.

There were shuffling noises, and a few leaves slowly fluttered down from the holes in the cave ceiling. Hawkeye's face appeared, glowing in the sunlight. "Edward?"

"The one and only," Ed said, glad of the prospect of getting out of the damp cave. He shook Al, who woke with a bleary yawn. Neither of them moved to get off the ground.

"Are you two alright? Are you hurt?" Hawkeye called. Her eyes flickered around the cave, and Ed realized that she probably couldn't see them in the darkness.

"We're okay," Ed shouted back. "But there's a drop right below you."

Hawkeye peered down to verify his statement and backed out of view.

"Fine mess you've gotten yourself into this time, Fullmetal," Ed heard distantly. Mustang. He didn't answer.

"To your left is another hole," he called. "The ground slants right underneath. You can probably jump down."

More shuffling and distant shouting. Ed took a moment to check over his brother again, running a hand through Al's hair. Al tilted his head obediently, and Ed found only dried blood. His hand came back clean.

"Okay?" Ed asked.

Al nodded. "Been better," he said faintly. Then he smiled wryly. "But I've also been worse."

Ed snorted. "How's the arm?"

"About the same as my head," Al said lightly, wincing as Ed ran his fingers over Al's bandaged arm. Ed murmured an apology.

With a soft noise, a pair of boots appeared in the crevice, and Hawkeye jumped down, tied back with a rope crossed over her chest. She took a moment to light a lantern, which she gingerly set down on the ground before surveying the cave around her cautiously, eyes falling on the Elrics.

Al gave her a weak wave.

"You said you were fine," she said in a tone that was as accusing as Hawkeye's ever got. No doubt she had taken in the blood caked on the side of Al's head and face.

"We are, considering," Ed said, nodding at the Beast between them. Ed and Al were at the lowest section of the cave floor, and the Mirkworm sat between them and Hawkeye, its massive body draped over the steeply sloping earth.

"This will be a problem," Hawkeye murmured, her faint voice carrying in the silence of the cave. Another pair of boots appeared, and Mustang slid out, his chest tied in a similar fashion to Hawkeye's. He carried with him a thick rope looped around his arm. His good eye settled on the pair of them, narrowing, and Ed could almost feel the air thicken for his lecture like pressure before a rainstorm.

Before he had a chance to speak, Ed called quickly, "Don't think you need the equipment," he said. "Not if you've got some chalk or something to write with."

Mustang deflated. "Chalk?" he parroted.

"Yeah. Got any?"

Mustang rummaged in his coat. A good alchemist—besides Ed, anyway—never left home without a supply of chalk, and Ed wasn't surprised when Mustang produced some from an inside coat pocket.

"Good," Ed said tiredly, stretching his legs. Al slowly moved back, and Ed shook the leg that had fallen asleep under his brother's weight. "I'll walk you through an array to make stairs for us."

"Where's the alchemy going to come from?" Mustang asked, though he set the rope down nevertheless.

"From _that_," Ed said, pointing to the Mirkworm, which was oozing something grey from an open wound. "I didn't notice before for some reason, but you can feel the alchemy in them, and it gets stronger after they die."

Mustang stared blankly, then shook his head. "Wait. _Feel the alchemy in them?_"

Ed nodded, then turned to Al, who was watching him through half-lidded eyes. "I could feel it last night, just before it attacked us," he said. "Now that it's dead, the alchemy's just seeping out." He hesitated. "I think we can use it," he said finally. "Whatever alchemy it had. I think we can use it."

"Edward," Hawkeye said gently. "I'm not sure that—"

"I'm not crazy. _I_ didn't hit my head. Look, just try it."

Mustang met Hawkeye's gaze for a moment, and then he shrugged. "Fine," he said. "Tell me what to do."

The array was created with a tolerable amount of argument, ("Are you kidding me? Just draw the freaking sigil, and then—" "I _know _how the representations work, Fullmetal, but I'm accounting for—") which was probably to be expected. By the time Mustang had completed the array—though Edward grumbled that he'd have liked to check it over—the cave had brightened a bit with the moving sun, and Havoc was peering down into the cave to see what was taking so long.

"Good to see the two of ya in one piece, boss, Al," Havoc said easily, half out of sight. "Things would have been a lot more boring without you guys around."

Ed grinned up at Havoc, glad for his friend's even-tempered forgiveness. "Not planning on going anywhere anytime soon," he assured him.

"Alright," Mustang said, bending out of sight past the fallen Mirkworm. "Here it goes."

Ed hadn't realized how much he missed the familiar light of alchemy and its warm glow as it washed over him, making his skin tingle. When the light receded, a set of neat stairs flowed from the crevice at the top of the cave and down to the bottom of the pit where Ed and Al still sat.

Mustang and Hawkeye were upon them almost at once. "I'm fine," Ed said as Hawkeye bent down to check him over. "It's Al who's hit his head."

"Just a bump," Al protested, but as Mustang helped him up, the younger Elric swayed dizzily. For his part, Ed felt almost too tired to stand, and his legs were nearly too shaky to support him. With a good deal of help, the Elrics made their slow way to the top of the stairs, and Havoc lent a hand to pull them up into the blinding sunlight.

"C'mon, you two," Havoc said once they'd tumbled out and onto the ground above. "I think you've caused us enough worry for one day. Most of the cave exits are closed off by rockslides now. We thought you were gone for good."

"Sorry," Al said sheepishly, but Havoc waved him off.

"Yeah, well. We're all getting older," Havoc said, and his tone was joking, though his expression wasn't. "You two had better think about us, too. One of these days, you'll take us all out with heart attacks."

He hauled Ed to his feet and helped him in the direction of the town. Mustang was helping his brother, and the icy look on the Brigadier-General's face told Ed that he wasn't about to get off so easily there. His commanding officer wasn't in the mood for jokes. "I need some help understanding how you I could order you to stay in Central, but the two of you somehow ended up hours outside of town," he said coldly. "The orders were hardly difficult. Stay put. That was all you had to do."

"Your _orders _were to do the research, which is what we came here to do in the first place. It's not like we meant to have a funfest with that Mirkworm!"

"I told you to do research _in the hospital,_" Mustang snarled. "For someone as smart as you, it shouldn't be too difficult to understand."

"What, so you're finally admitting I've got a brain of my own, Mustang?" Ed laughed bitterly. "Because I wasn't about to sit around twiddling my thumbs while—"

"You know, you might be a year older, Edward, but you're acting more like a child than you were when you went into the Gate in the first place."

"Are you _kidding_ me? Al and I just—"

"That's enough, both of you!" Hawkeye shouted, annoyed. "With all due respect, let's just get everyone back to Central in one piece. There will be more than enough time to be at each other's throats later."

For the rest of the journey, Havoc kept up a steady stream of chatter and wisecracks as the three officers helped the Elrics into town. Ed half-suspected that the man was doing it in order to keep Mustang's ire from falling onto Ed again, but Havoc also had the habit of listening to himself talk when he had the chance, so it was hard to be sure. Either way, Ed was grateful: Mustang did remain quiet for the entirety of the trip, only treating Ed to cold looks and fuming silently to himself.

Ed was almost too exhausted to care. If he'd had the energy, he'd have been shouting into Mustang's face already, but his aching limbs made it easy to ignore his commanding officer. When they finally reached the inn, a frantic Nora rushed up to hug the Elrics ecstatically, looking close to tears and insisting on washing the blood from the side of Al's face.

By the time they'd reached the bus, Ed was fading fast. Al passed out on the seat next to him as soon as he'd settled down. Ed barely had the energy to wave back to Nora, who had come to see them off.

He was vaguely aware of the murmur of voices around him as he nodded off, giving in to sleep with the knowledge that he and Al were safe at last.

.

Someone was shaking him. His entire body ached, and he felt as though the crawl back to consciousness would take more strength than he had.

"C'mon, boss," a voice said.

But Ed couldn't, and he felt the world fade around him for a minute, until suddenly he was moving. He was dimly aware that he was on someone's back, and that the last time he'd ridden piggyback, he'd been five or six and it had been with Hoenheim as they made their way home one evening.

"Aren't they too old…?" The voices faded, swirling into the warm darkness that swallowed Ed and his memories.

.

Roy Mustang was going to murder the Fullmetal Alchemist. His hands were twitching. He had half a mind to try to rub some of the muscle tension out of his aching back, and half a mind to strangle Ed in his sleep instead.

That last wasn't a bad idea, he thought to himself as he awkwardly leaned back in the metal hospital chair.

No one had been allowed to see the Elrics yet, and with the ongoing disaster that had become daily life in Central, none of them really had the time to linger for an update. Yet they had all eventually wandered back here to the hospital after their afternoon shifts, Havoc fingering the butt of his gun as he paced wearily around the crowded waiting room, Hawkeye leafing through a stack of documents she'd brought over. Roy in the chair, contemplating murder.

He could probably even make it look like an accident, he thought to himself, resting the back of his head against the wall. Just an accident, and then he'd never have to worry himself sick over Edward's reckless antics again.

Except that Al was too smart, and would probably figure out that he had done it. Pity that. He supposed it would be too risky after all.

The sound of footsteps drew him from his musings, and he looked up to see a nurse approaching as she stared down at her clipboard. As had been happening for the past hour or so, everyone in the cramped waiting area drew themselves up simultaneously, looking up hopefully, desperately, to hear news of the victims of the last two days.

But the nurse's gaze settled on the blue-clad officers. "Friends of the Elrics?" she said, and without waiting for an answer pivoted to lead them down the hallway.

The three of them scrambled to follow. "Both brothers will recover," she said without preamble, standing to one side to avoid a passing stretcher. "Alphonse has a severe concussion. He's still unconscious, but is expected to wake within the next few hours. We'll know more when he does. Fortunately, there was no further damage to his broken arm…he does have a series of scrapes that only add to the ones he already had," she said with a sigh, without looking up from the paperwork cradled in her arms.

"Edward's lungs are still healing on schedule, despite the…well, _detour_ he took. He's suffering from exhaustion, and _his _bruises and scratches are only consistent with what we've already seen throughout his file…" She let the papers slip back into place on the clipboard. "Nothing too serious. They're lucky, compared to the other things we've been seeing."

"Are they awake yet?" Havoc asked.

"Edward is, as of a few minutes ago. The doctor woke him to check his lungs again. If you need to see him, you'll have to do it now, because with the little rest he's had in the last forty-eight hours, he'll probably be out like a light after his head hits the pillow."

"We'll need to talk to him," Mustang said firmly.

The nurse nodded, expecting this. "Nothing too strenuous," she warned. "He's right over there, in the corner room."

"Could you excuse us for a second?" Hawkeye asked suddenly, and it wasn't really a question. The woman said nothing, losing herself in her files as she moved away to take on the next problem.

"I don't think we all need to go in," Hawkeye murmured, moving toward Edward's room once the nurse had gone.

Havoc hummed in agreement. "I'll go for a smoke and head to the office. Now that we know the boss is safe, anyway."

"I'll talk to Fullmetal," Roy said.

"No," Hawkeye said firmly, surprising him. "I'll talk to him." With anyone else, Roy would have been annoyed at the insubordination. With Hawkeye, he was just confused.

"Why?"

"I don't think he needs to hear from you right now, sir," she said, in a tone that was almost apologetic. "Edward obviously doesn't enjoy being ordered around—whether he's a part of the military or not," she added, correctly anticipating that Roy would try to interject. "He's always been…something of a special case. You know it as well as I do."

Roy nodded, grudgingly. "That doesn't mean he _should_ get special treatment."

"With the rest of us, your orders would be accepted without issue. But things are different with Edward." She paused, continuing softly, "We all know that you're just trying to look after the Elrics, sir, like you'd do for any of us, whether they believe they can handle things on their own or not."

"In this case, they _couldn't._" Roy said, exasperated.

"Sir," Hawkeye said determinedly, flipping absently through the stack of papers in her arms. "I'm far from condoning their actions. But you can't behave as though you expect Edward to be a normal subordinate." She smiled, and added dryly, "And maybe if the two of you tried to have a civil conversation, you might even surprise yourselves. Edward respects you, sir. But you have to give him a little breathing room in order to see it."

Roy did nothing but raise an eyebrow.

"I know it's difficult to believe, sir," Hawkeye said, "but Edward would value your input if you gave it to him the right way. Besides," she added, "we'll need both of you to work things out between you. I think we'd all forgotten how reckless Edward can be when he wants something badly enough, and none of us expected him to throw himself back into danger after being dead to us for a year. We're all worried, but the last thing we need is for Ed to run off after the two of you fight again."

She put her hand on the doorknob. "At any rate, I think you've done enough to rile him up for one day, sir," she said, not caring about the insult. "So I'll take care of this for now. But in the future, you'll have to look out for him."

Hawkeye pulled the door open and stepped into the room, leaving Roy outside in the hallway, frowning.

Havoc had backed away at some point to give the pair of them some semblance of privacy, but when Roy turned to him, the First Lieutenant was obviously fighting to hide a smirk. "I'm not sure what that was, chief," he said, "but I think it might've been a lesson in parenting."

.

The combination of exhaustion and misery had settled onto Edward as soon as the doctor closed the door behind him. Alphonse had been wheeled out for some sort of checkup, leaving Ed alone in the horrible, sterilized hospital room. Bandages roped up and down his chest, and his skin halfheartedly protested each new bruise, which made each movement unpleasant. Altogether, Ed was exhausted but too stubborn to go back to sleep without Al in the room.

_Al's fine, though_, he reassured himself. _Of course he is. _It didn't matter that his brother hadn't woken, even after careful prodding from the doctors. That didn't mean much. But he'd be able to relax a bit more if someone would just give him a straight answer about it…

The door opened suddenly, and Ed jolted in surprise. Hawkeye stood in the opening with a stack of papers under her left arm.

She moved as gracefully and professionally as always, but she had that gleam in her eye, the one she adopted when Mustang wasn't doing his work properly, and Ed steeled himself for another lecture. He was suddenly aware of his bandages, and he crossed his arms over his chest as though to hide them away, trying to figure out what to say without being apologetic, exactly.

He'd rather have had Mustang visit. Hawkeye wasn't very easy to yell at.

"Edward. You and Al could have been killed," she said without preamble.

"We weren't." Ed said, "We were careful."

"You weren't careful enough. You can't even do alchemy right now, Edward," she said firmly, her hands brushing at invisible dirt specks on her uniform. "Running around blindly at a time like this is hardly one of your best ideas."

"I _wasn't _running around blindly," Ed grumbled. "Al and I were doing some research. We think we might be able to reconstruct the array used for the gate's creation."

Hawkeye gave a long-suffering sigh. "I understand that. But it's dangerous out there," she said slowly, as though choosing her words carefully. "And that's not always something you think about before you jump into things. You could have been hurt a lot worse than you were. _Al_ could have been hurt worse than he was."

Ed grimaced, opening his mouth.

"I know you didn't mean for that to happen," Hawkeye added somberly. "You're brilliant, Edward, but sometimes you just don't think—you never used to, and you don't now—at least about your own safety." She hesitated, then plunged on. "We've told you before, Ed, that it might be better for you to trust us adults. Just a little."

"Fine, I know I screwed up—but I was just going after the research, like Mustang said."

"Does that mean you couldn't have waited so that someone could go with you?" Hawkeye asked, tilting her head.

Ed looked away.

"You just need to be more careful. You _can_ ask for help when you need it." She relaxed, leaning back on her heels. "In any case. That's not entirely why I came in. The doctor is busy at the moment, but he told us that Al will be fine. He's still bruised, but they've patched him up well, and the swelling of the concussion has mostly gone down. He may have a slight headache, but he'll be back to normal with a bit of rest. No lasting damage."

"Thanks," he said genuinely. "I was worried he might…"

"It looked worse than it was," Hawkeye said. "And with all of the blows you've taken to your own head, you should know by now that head wounds always bleed badly."

By the twist of her mouth, it was obvious that she was only joking, and that happened so rarely that Ed couldn't find it in himself to be offended. He offered her a smile. "He'll need checkups, though?"

"It wouldn't be a bad idea," Hawkeye said. She paused. "You know, the two of you are going to have to be more careful from now on no matter what happens. Al won't be able to run around like a shield to get you out of trouble."

"I didn't mean for…" Ed shook his head. "I shouldn't have dragged him into it."

_"_Well, that's—" Hawkeye began.

"I'd almost rather he were still a suit of armor," he added. He and Hawkeye both froze, equally surprised. "Not that—I don't—" Ed added hastily. He paused and then spoke deliberately. "I'm _glad _he's human. Really glad. It's everything I wanted. It's just that he's so much more…I don't know…"

"Fragile?" Hawkeye murmured.

"_Exactly._" He breathed. "Before, we could both run around anywhere, do anything, and I'd never have to worry, because I knew he'd be alright. You could throw anything at him, and he'd take it. But now, he's…you know. Human."

For a moment, the silence hung in the air.

"Human. Like you." Hawkeye pointed out.

Ed nodded. "And that's great. But—"

"Edward," Hawkeye said after a moment, "do you think Alphonse lacks intelligence?"

"What? No," Ed said instantly, "That's not what I'm saying—"

"And do you worry that he's less skilled in combat?"

"No. Al can take care of himself as much as I can."

Hawkeye's arms had folded in front of her. "Then why do you worry about him more than yourself? Why do you make special provisions for him, but not for yourself?"

Ed paused. "That's different."

"No, it isn't." She smiled at him. "You know, I think this will be good for you," she added. "Maybe you'll never realize how much trouble you throw _yourself _into, but if you're worried about dragging Al into it as well, you might at least hold back a little."

Ed fumbled, "Yeah, but I can handle whatever comes at me."

Hawkeye shook her head. "But you don't have to." She frowned. "I think you forget sometimes that you're only human too. You want to protect Al, I know, but…don't forget we're meant to protect you too."

She was halfway through the door before he could work out what to say, but she stopped suddenly and looked back.

"And Edward," she said, hesitating. "It may not look like it, but the Brigadier-General does care about the two of you. He just doesn't know what to do with all of his worry."

Ed might have snorted aloud or protested, but her face was too strange. The expression on it was odd and wistful.

"He orders you around because it's the only way he thinks he can keep you out of trouble. And he _wants _to keep you out of trouble. This past year hasn't been easy on any of us. Not even him," she added, pinning him with the steely glare that he was more used to. "Cut him some slack, won't you?"

She disappeared into the hallway, and Ed stared at the door as it slowly swung shut, his mind rattling away.

.

**A/N: **Aaaand Hawkeye leaves everyone speechless. She really is a gem, isn't she? And I'm not sure that Edward will ever realize that she saved him from being possibly murdered at the hands of his CO. Lucky for him, that.

Thanks to all who reviewed last chapter, especially my anonymous guests I can't respond to by pm. And thanks again for stopping by today! Please leave me a note to let me know what you think!

~ket

**Next Chapter: **Ed's New, Improved, and Completely Not-Suicidal Plan


	9. Ed's New, Improved, and Completely Not

**.:Nine:.**

**Ed's New, Improved, and Completely Not-Suicidal Plan**

.

Ed wasn't sure whether his nerves came from the thoughts racing through his head or the faint glimmer of alchemy somewhere off in the distance, lingering like a threat, but by the time Al finally woke the next morning, Ed was more than ready to get the hell out of the hospital.

"Brother," Al said, exasperated, "I thought we went through this yesterday." He was once more picking at the hospital food absently, stirring the mashed potatoes around the way that he had when their mother was still alive and he'd wanted to make it look like he'd eaten something. Bandages looped around his forehead and wound around his arm in testament to yesterday's injuries.

"I know," Ed said, "but this is different." For his part, Ed had only new bruises, which was nothing he wasn't used to. His strength was slowly returning, and he was finding that his lungs weren't acting as though air was a foreign substance anymore. The doctor had informed him that he was extremely lucky that the stunt he'd pulled hadn't resulted in further complications.

"How is it different?" His brother asked skeptically.

"Because what we learned yesterday might mean that we can stop all of this," he said, not bothering to explain what _this _was. They'd both been listening to the shouting in the hallway, the lists of injuries, the news broadcasts detailing each new wave of Beasts. "We have the array…and I think we have the alchemy, too."

Al looked up in interest. Ed knew his brother hadn't been fully conscious yesterday—Al had explained that everything that had happened after the Mirkworm attacked seemed vague and fuzzy—and Al probably wouldn't have realized the gravity of what Ed had learned.

But the thought of Al's concussion brought Ed's eyes to the bandages again, to his brother's weary movements, and to the paleness of his skin. "We're not due for release until the afternoon," he said slowly, "so maybe you should stay while I go talk to Mustang. You'll probably miss the shouting match, though," he added to himself.

"I'm not staying, Brother."

Ed hesitated. "Look, Al. You're just coming back from a concussion, and your arm's still bandaged. I think you've been hurt enough over these last few days." _And it's been mostly my fault_.

"No," Al said firmly. "I'll be fine. I'm coming with you." His little brother swung his legs over the side of the bed and stood, swaying a lot less than Ed might have imagined. His glare might have been more forceful had he not still been clad in the hospital gown.

"Al, you should really stay for longer," he began, and was surprised when Al interrupted.

"No. Brother, if you'd been injured like I was, you wouldn't be giving yourself any time to recover. So don't make a special case for me." Al looked uncharacteristically offended.

"But that's what I do, Al," Ed said quietly. "I look out for you."

"I can handle myself," Al said, eyes flashing. Then, he seemed to realize his position—glaring at Ed, with his hands on his hips—and sat down on the bed, mouth pressed in a thin line.

"I know you can handle yourself," Ed said before Al could speak up again. "And it's not that I don't think you're up to it exactly. I'm just worrying. It's what I do," he said with a slight smile, hoping to receive one in return, but Al was still frowning.

With a sudden jolt, Ed remembered the conversation he'd shared with Hawkeye the evening before, and he sighed. "Also…I don't think I'm used to you being like this yet," he admitted. Al tilted his head in confusion. "You know," Ed said evasively. "Not metal, I guess. Flesh and blood."

Al blinked, taking a moment to process the last bit of information. "Oh," he said to himself. "But—Brother, I may be human, but I'm just as human as you are. And besides that, I can probably still kick your butt in a real fight."

Ed snorted, but grinned. "I guess we'll have to find out sometime."

"I feel like Winry right now," Al continued, folding his arms. "How we're always trying to leave her behind so she won't be hurt. She says that we don't let her all the way in, and I didn't get it at first. But I do now."

Ed frowned. "I'm not trying to leave you behind, Al. I'm just trying to protect you."

"No," Al argued, "you're trying to _overprotect _me."

"Al—" Ed began again, frustrated.

The door clicked open, and the shouting and clamor from the hallway spilled into their room. They turned to find the doctor standing there, smiling in spite of everything.

"Well," he said good-naturedly, oblivious to the tenseness in the air. "Aren't the two of you looking better? How do you feel?" The question was directed at Al.

"I'm fine," Al said, relaxing. "My head doesn't hurt anymore."

"Good, good," the doctor said, scribbling something onto his charts. "I'm glad the two of you agreed to stay overnight this time," he added mildly.

"We did," Ed said, looking at Al, who was half-leaning against the headboard, whether for support or not Ed couldn't be sure. No matter. Al was right—they needed to stay together. Both of them had just come out badly from an encounter with the Beasts, and that they would both need to watch each other's backs so that they wouldn't have another one quite so soon. He looked back at the doctor. "But now, we'll be leaving."

"Both of you?" The doctor said as Al looked at his brother in surprise.

"Both of us," Ed said firmly. "Where do we sign?"

.

They changed into their street clothes, Ed once again missing his trademark red coat. (If for no other reason, they needed to get crush these Beasts and get alchemy back so he could make a new one. Al's clothes weren't really his style.) He seriously doubted that Mustang would agree to send over a car to pick them up after they'd signed out early—again—and decided that he'd rather put off that screaming match until the brothers reached Mustang's office. He wished he had enough money to call a cab, but headquarters wasn't too far away—ten minutes at a brisk walk. Which meant fifteen or twenty today, allowing for their injuries and the general damage and debris of the streets.

There were few Beasts around, as Ed had suspected. With his new-found ability to sense alchemy, he'd recognized only tiny flickers here and there—Gatekeepers, they'd discovered—and a strange, threatening energy that rolled in thick waves from somewhere far off in the distance. What that meant, Ed wasn't sure, but it made his skin crawl and prickle, as though the air around him crackled with electricity. He shook himself, wishing to be rid of the distracting sensation.

"You said that we had the alchemy too," Al said abruptly, drawing his attention. "What did you mean by that?" There had been no further discussion of the conversation that the doctor had interrupted.

"Mustang was able to create a set of stairs using the dead Mirkworm," Ed informed him. "After drawing the array, with the Mirkworm just touching it, he was able to use alchemy."

Al was quiet for a moment. "Which means that the Beasts possess some sort of alchemy. That makes sense for some of them, like the Angler," he said. "But the Mirkworm didn't seem to have any special…talent."

Ed was shaking his head. "No, I think it's more than that. I think the Beasts are _made _of alchemy. It would kind of explain why I can feel them sometimes…I think maybe I spent so much time in the Gate, surrounded by alchemy, that I can tell when I'm around it again. When I landed in Aquaroya for the first time…I just remember feeling like there was something missing. It was weird not being surrounded by alchemy anymore…"

Al was studying him with an odd expression on his face. "Okay," he allowed finally. "Okay, well then, we'll have to…what? Use the Beasts to get the alchemy for the Gate?"

"Dead Beasts," Ed corrected.

"_Dead _Beasts," Al echoed, frowning.

"It gets better," Ed added. "I think the kinds of Beasts we need are the powerful ones. The ones that can actually perform alchemy themselves. Like the Angler. And with the amount of alchemy needed for the Gate…we'll need a lot of alchemy. And a lot of Beasts."

Al's eyebrows crept upwards. "This sounds really risky, Brother," he said. "You're planning on killing multiple Beasts close enough to a drawn array? Beasts that can perform alchemy, while we're practically defenseless? It sounds…suicidal."

"It does," Ed readily agreed. "But it's the only plan we've got." A flicker of alchemy distracted him, and the brothers watched as a Gatekeeper raced across the street, thin arms waving in the air as it screeched at the top of its lungs.

The flickers of alchemy became bursts as more Gatekeepers darted across the street, clambering over crushed cars and sooty rubble. They whooped and screeched, their large eyes wider than normal as they rushed eastward.

"That's…odd," Al said over the din. He must have murmured something else, but Ed couldn't quite hear him. He instinctively pulled his little brother flat against the wall of a half-demolished shop as he stared with wide eyes in the direction the Keepers had come from.

A storm rolled in the distance, thick grey clouds just visible over the tops of the buildings that had escaped the Pyro's rampage. It was almost too far away to make out, but Ed thought he could just see brief flickers of lightning in the dark western sky.

"Shit," he breathed in realization. There was only one Beast he knew of with that amount of energy.

"What?" Al asked, craning his head to see what Ed was looking at. The Keepers had all fled, and the street before them was empty.

"It's the Leviathan."

"Is that…another Beast?"

"Yeah," Ed said, not sure why he was being so quiet. He could feel the waves of alchemy that flowed from the storm. It was moving slower than honey, lazily wandering in their general direction.

"Should we turn back?" Al whispered, adopting his brother's tense mood.

Ed shook his head. "No, it's too slow. Not close enough for worry yet, but…that thing's got more than enough alchemy for the array," he murmured suddenly. "It's massive, and capable of all sorts of elemental alchemy—earthquakes, fires, storms—we wouldn't have to kill a ton of Beasts at once."

"But that makes it more dangerous, right? Brother?"

Ed tore his eyes away from the distant storm, dragging his brother toward headquarters, pressing both of them close to the walls of the buildings as though it might help him to escape the sensation that crawled down his back. Al pulled away gently, and Ed slowed, remembering that his brother couldn't move quite so fast today. Al watched him expectantly as his thoughts whirled around in his mind.

"Well, this plan just keeps getting better and better. I'm not sure which is worse: trying to kill a bunch of Beasts, or trying to kill the mother of all Beasts." He stuffed his hands into his pockets, leading Al onwards more slowly this time. "It's like someone up there in the universe just loves me."

.

The frantic activity of Mustang's office, so characteristic of almost everywhere Edward had been since the Gate had been opened, stopped gradually as the officers within looked up to recognize the intruders. Hawkeye was shaking her head wearily, though Edward couldn't be sure whether she was doing so in exasperation or whether she might really try to stop them.

"Ed. Al." Havoc said quietly, eyes flickering to the wooden door behind him that hid their commanding officer. "You really should go before the chief sees you."

Al made some kind of apologetic sound, but Ed crossed over the piles of paperwork and to the door before anyone could stop him. It swung open slowly, hesitantly, to reveal Mustang, whose surprise only lasted a second before his face began to darken.

"Fullmetal," he growled, a low, dark sound that betrayed his annoyance. "Wasn't it enough that you and your brother were nearly killed yesterday? Didn't you learn your lesson the last time you left the hospital early?" He rose to his feet, walking around to meet them at the front of the desk. "I almost can't believe that you find it so _difficult _to obey the same order, _twice_—"

Maybe it was Hawkeye's persuasion from yesterday—it was hard to be sure—but somehow Ed only heard an echo as if from far away that yelled, "_Now, why the hell did you two run away without asking for my help first?_"

"I'm sorry." Ed said loudly, entertained despite himself at the way Mustang's face opened up in disbelief. He thought he might have heard a low whistle from behind him. "Yeah, I know—who'd have thought I'd ever say it?" he added. "You're probably just as surprised as I am."

Mustang looked flummoxed, so Ed pushed on. "And you're right. And we need your help."

"Help?" Mustang asked, having finally gotten his words to work again. "Don't tell me you've got another of your stunts in the works," he said suspiciously.

"You could say something like that," Ed murmured.

"Edward," Hawkeye said, and Ed turned to see all of Mustang's subordinates gathered close to the office door, presumably there to catch whatever fireworks were to be had. "We're happy that you've come to us for help, of course," she said, shooting a look in Mustang's general direction, "but you and Alphonse have already been badly hurt. I don't think we can risk anything of your normal dangerous caliber," she finished firmly.

"But Brother thinks this might really stop everything," Al said quietly. "You should hear him out."

After a beat, Hawkeye hummed in agreement, and Mustang sighed and nodded, sitting down on the edge of the desk. "What, really?" Ed asked, looking around. "That's all it takes? Al has to back me up?"

"Well, boss," Havoc began with his easy grin, "Al's a bit more, ah—" Breda and Fuery chimed in as he fumbled for the right word.

"Responsible."

"Levelheaded."

"_Alright! _I get the picture," Ed grumbled as Al shot him a sweet smile. "Anyway. Even with all of the fuss, we actually learned a lot by going to the caves. Some of the caverns include the plans that were supposed to have been the foundations of the Gate. They were basically designed to create the Gate thousands of years ago. With these, we can recreate the array and reconstruct the Gate—of course, the designs might have to be tweaked a bit, because the separate plane is already there and so we wouldn't need any additional sigils to ground it, and we should only need to fill in a few extra tiers in order to seal off the alchemy itself…" He trailed off, registering that several stares were becoming glossy. Mustang alone was looking at him intently, hopefully, his head tilted to one side as though processing all of the information.

"At any rate, the Mirkworm may have complicated things a bit," he admitted, finding no small pleasure in watching Mustang grimace at the understatement, "but we've got what we need now." He held out the pair of notebooks they'd salvaged. The edges of the pages were slightly damp, and the ink spilled over into places it shouldn't. Hawkeye and Mustang flipped through the pages slowly, looking more and more focused. Hawkeye glanced meaningfully at Mustang, who grimaced again.

Finally: "The details are a bit hard to make out," Mustang said diplomatically. This was very kind, considering that the ink on the page he was staring at had bled so badly that the lettering was unrecognizable.

Hawkeye cleared her throat, then added, "I'm obviously not very practiced in alchemy, but it seems like a very big design, and there aren't very many pages…"

"We're aware," Al said easily.

"Then your trip wasn't very helpful," Mustang grumbled. "You have maybe half of the array. So it's not much help to us now, is it?"

Ed was staring at them blankly. "Al and I can remember the rest. We just have to piece it together."

Mustang blinked, confused, and then snorted. "Right," he said. "Genii."

"So you're thinking you can just draw out this…array, and then we find a Beast for you to use? Like in the caves at Senna?" Havoc asked.

"Oh, it gets better," Al said, looking at Ed out of the corner of his eye. "Brother thinks we'll need to kill a Beast alright, but not just any Beast. A powerful one."

"The more power, the more alchemy," Ed said defensively, raising his shoulders.

"Wait, wait—" Mustang said, waving his hands in the air. "Think about how this is going to work out. You'd have to draw the array in advance, of course, because it's too complicated to do quickly…And it would have to be somewhere with a lot of room, because it's huge, correct? After that, how were you planning on killing the Beast in the precise location of the array? I'm assuming the Beast needs to be touching the array in order to keep to the circuit."

"That's the thing," Ed said. "I think I know the Beast we need. And I think it's heading this way, sort of. Other than that, we'll have to find some way of steering it where we need it."

"What kind of Beast?" Breda asked.

"And does it _have _to be dead? These things haven't exactly been easy to kill," Havoc added.

"I know, I know," Ed said. "Just hear me out, though. You're not going to like this any more than I do."

.

They didn't.

While Ed slowly begun to detail his plan, frantic reports interrupted him with alarming frequency as the military struggled to deal with approaching Leviathan, which had settled itself in the business district with no indication that it was inclined to leave anytime soon. Its control of multiple forms of elemental alchemy meant that it was creating catastrophes so quickly that it was nearly impossible to keep up: an earthquake rattled buildings, a typhoon pelted the earth, fires engulfed the area, and sandstorms buried alive any citizens foolish enough to remain in the area.

As the Elrics argued a few points, Ed paused to answer questions from the phone lines. The worst of them concerned the feeling of energy, of electricity—alchemy, Ed had informed Hawkeye as she relayed the information from the telephone—that grew more powerful the closer you were to the Beast. One touch induced seizures and unconsciousness. The few that had been exposed for longer than a few seconds had died.

"And—it doesn't seem to slow down for bullets," Havoc added, listening intently to another phone.

"It wouldn't," Ed said grimly. "It's a lot like the homunculi. It just pushes things out of its body."

"Brother," Al said, picking up one of their arguments as though the previous conversation hadn't happened, "I don't understand why you have to put yourself in danger for this. How do you think you're going to even get close to it?"

"Because I'm your best bet," Ed said instantly, registering the doubt and worry in everyone's faces. "Anyone else who gets too close, who touches it—they're out. But me, I was in the Gate for a year, consistently exposed to pure alchemy. If it didn't kill me then, it won't now. I'm the only one who's got half a chance."

"'Half a chance'…" Fuery echoed.

"You know what I mean. Besides, it's not like we have a choice," Ed argued exasperatedly. "What was the body count so far again? In the last half hour?"

Mustang's grimaced. "Alright," he agreed. "Something needs to be done. But it needs to be smart. You may be able to get close to the Beast, Fullmetal, but how were you planning on killing it? And don't forget that it doesn't need to touch you to attack you. Its control of the elements is enough."

"Well, I'm pretty good at dodging," Ed said easily, half-laughing, but the tension in the air only thickened as the others stared at him grimly. "Okay, okay," he said seriously, backpedaling. "No joking around. Look, everything's got a weakness, and for the Leviathan, it's the heart. All I need to do is get rid of it."

Mustang eyed him as though he was insane, but Breda was nodding thoughtfully. "Makes sense," he agreed slowly. "All the other things—the smaller ones, anyway—they die when you pierce their heart. It's only the bigger ones with thick hides or shells that have too much protection for a bullet to take them out."

"And the Leviathan's basically made up of a lot of plasma. It slows even heavy bullets down enough that it can push them out. But I think I can get in there and take the heart out myself."

The office was quiet. Al's face was somber, his hands clenched on the table. Mustang paced slowly behind the desk.

"No offense, boss," said Havoc, whose stress seemed to have gotten high enough for him to ignore headquarters' smoking ban, "but this sounds easier said than done."

"Nobody said it would be easy," Ed said roughly. "But I don't see any other way."

He turned to his younger brother, half-regretting his next words, but knowing that they were necessary. "Al needs to be there, too. Someone needs to draw the array. It'll take time, and it'll have to be laid out completely by the time I'm finished. And the quicker we finish everything, the quicker all of the damage stops. The flooding, sandstorms, fires—all that will disappear once it dies, so we need to work quickly before this thing takes out half of Central's population."

Al nodded, a soft look in his eyes. "Okay. Where are we going to do this? The array needs a lot of space."

"The plaza in front of Central Bank," Mustang said instantly. "It's near enough to the destruction, and it seems large enough for the design. We might have to figure out how to herd the Leviathan toward it, though."

"It shouldn't be too hard," Breda said. "From the reports we've been getting, it doesn't like heavy artillery—takes a while to push the bullets back out. As long as we keep pounding it in the direction we want it to go, we can keep it in the right area."

"And you'll have to," Ed added firmly. "The elemental alchemy won't stop when it dies, and if it dies anywhere else, it will take even longer for all of the chaos to stop—we'll have to find a way to move the body or somewhere to redraw the entire array. And I'm not exactly going to be in a position to watch what's going on."

"Why's that?"

"Well," Ed said slowly, "the Leviathan's made of this dark, thick plasma, right? When you look at it, you can usually just make out the heart. It glows a little in the center. So—well, you're not going to like this either—I've got to get through the plasma and pull the thing out."

"No," Mustang said instantly. "_Inside_ the Beast, Ed? It does enough damage from the outside. It'll kill you."

"You may be the only one who can touch it, Boss," Havoc added, "but there's gotta be something else we can do."

"There's _nothing,_" Ed snarled. "And if we don't do something, people are just going to keep dying," he spat. Their faces hardened in response to the vehemence in his voice, and he paused. "You're going to have to trust me with this. I've done this before. I can do it again. Besides," he added, "you'll probably be in more danger than I am. The Beast can't really hurt me while I'm inside of it. It'll just be trying to push me out."

The officers looked slightly mollified by that, but Al was watching him too carefully.

"Are you even sure that there will be enough alchemy to power the array?" Mustang asked wearily.

"We think so," Al offered hesitantly, as Ed nodded. "But there's no way of telling for sure. It's hard to calculate how much alchemy the Beast has."

"So. We're banking on Ed _possibly _being able to pull the heart out of the Leviathan, so that we can power an array that _might _work, and the alchemy that we have _might _be able to reconstruct the Gate, all while trying not to be killed by a huge monster with alchemic power we currently have no access to," Mustang summarized.

"Correct," Ed said instantly.

"It's practically a fifty-fifty suicide mission," said Al, turning back to Ed.

"I know," Ed admitted. "But we have to try. If we don't do something, the Beasts are going to keep destroying everything. If we don't do reconstruct the Gate…"

"…things will only get worse," Mustang allowed. "Right."

"We don't really have much time for other plans," Hawkeye added. "Half of the market district and the entire east division of headquarters are in ruins because of the fires, flooding has destroyed much of the suburbs, and with the Leviathan wreaking havoc in the business district…there won't be much left of Central. Not to mention that the body count is rising. I'm not sure how much longer we can keep this up. We're running out of resources."

There was a tense pause as everyone considered her words.

"Boss," Havoc said suddenly, "You said you'd done this before?"

"Not exactly," Ed said sheepishly. "I was inside the Leviathan once before, on accident," he admitted. "That's how I realized what the heart was, and that it was there in the first place. But I _know _this will work."

His statement was met only with frowns and silence. The phone was ringing again, drawing them into the next disaster. The Beast's alchemy might destroy half the city before it moved on, and they couldn't sit around while it happened.

Ed folded his arms across his chest. "We're running out of time," he said firmly. "Are we doing this or not?"

Surprisingly, it was Mustang who spoke first. "Alright," he said tiredly, pulling his coat over his shoulders. "The suicidal plan it is."

A few eyebrows rose at that, and Ed knew his face must have borne a similar look of surprise. Mustang shrugged them off, his face stony in the way that it usually was before a fight, the way it had been the last time Ed saw him before Mustang attacked the late Fuhrer King Bradley. "Have General Burns and Major Pierce pull their men back," he barked in his no-nonsense tone, eyes on Breda. "Tell them what's going on and make sure they stop pushing that Beast in the wrong direction. We'll need to head it off and turn it toward the plaza." The redhead snapped off a salute, instantly businesslike, and hurried off.

"Get General Arkene on the line," Mustang continued, speaking to Hawkeye. "I'll speak with him. The rest of you, get placements on the other men. We'll have to coordinate this attack, or it's worthless."

One thing you had to appreciate about Mustang, Ed mused as the man walked off, was that he could get things rolling quickly, and he ran a tight ship. Within seconds, everyone was back at work, worries and emotions slipping from of their faces as they aimed for their tasks.

A sharp tug on his shirt made Ed turn around; Al was dragging him aside. "Brother," he hissed, stopping near the window, "you're not telling us everything."

"What do you mean?"

Al crossed his arms, eyes narrowed. It was a pose that had looked odd when he was in the suit of armor. Now, it reminded Ed of their childhood, when an expression like that meant an uncharacteristic yelling spat. "Don't," Al said in a hushed voice. "I know you too well."

"Fine," Ed grumbled, wanting to get this over with before Al drew too much attention to them. Already, Havoc was glancing their way intermittently while attending to his phone call. Ed kept his voice low. "I may have downplayed some things."

"Like?"

"Like the fact that the plasma in the Leviathan might not kill me, but it'll still hurt like hell," he admitted quietly. "I'll probably have a hard time getting in and out, and I won't be much help afterward. But I'll help with the alchemy even if it kills me," he added fiercely, "because you're not doing that alone."

Al looked frightened. Ed couldn't have that, so he hurried on. "And you'll have to take care of yourself, because I won't be there to watch your back while you're doing the array. Don't get sucked in—keep an eye on your surroundings."

There. Now his brother looked slightly offended, but the expression morphed into a smile. "Who do you take me for, Brother?" he asked. "I think this time you'll just have to trust me."

"I can do that," Ed said quietly, but there must have been a Beast around, because something in the pit of his stomach was turning to lead.

.

.

.

**A/N: **So the plan actually seems pretty suicidal, just saying. I don't think Ed clarified that enough. BUT things are getting really interesting around here, and we'll have to see how much poor Ed can take before the end! :-) Tune in next time to find out! See you then, and please drop me a review!

~ket

**Next Chapter:** Things Only Get Worse from Here


	10. Things Only Get Worse From Here

**.:Ten:.**

**Things Only Get Worse from Here**

.

The biting autumn air whipped across Ed's face as he furiously spread the paint onto the smooth pavement. The heaviness in the pit of his stomach had only grown since they'd come down to the plaza to begin work on the array. He was trying desperately not to think about their foolish plan, as though by focusing on the scrawled painting he might imagine away what was coming next.

Al was working diligently beside him, his attention focused and alert, but his skin still had an ashen tint to it that Ed didn't like.

Ed swore to himself under his breath, more to dispel his pent up energy than anything else. "Brother," Al warned without taking his eyes off of the array.

Around them, officers flocked to and fro according to their orders, bearing cumbersome loads of guns or sandbags. The area was peppered with stations for heavy artillery and makeshift fortifications. Mustang and his men were ensuring that everyone gave the center of the plaza a wide berth, especially after a soldier had been careless enough to tread on a portion of the array and Ed had nearly torn him a new one.

His thoughts were wandering away from the array again, and Ed shook his head as if to clear his mind. The sigil for time and duration, followed by a link to the center to connect it to where Al had painted the seals for balance and strength. The designs began to layer like scaffolding across the ground.

He had done this a thousand times in his mind already, and he knew it all by heart. Even with the detail needed for the outer rings, there was not much to draw his attention.

"We've got the support of all the generals," Breda was reporting from somewhere behind him. "Even with as few details as we've given them. They don't understand all of it, but there's nothing to be done—this is the only workable plan. We've already lost half of Arkene's men, and we're likely to keep losing more if we don't do something."

"I imagine they've also realized that Edward and the Brigadier-General know the most about alchemy," Hawkeye said wryly. "Otherwise, I doubt they'd defer to someone below their own standing."

"And the heavy artillery and ammunition?" Mustang asked, sounding pressed.

A pause. Shuffling footsteps. "Hakuro's made a mess of things, sir," Breda said. "We haven't got all the guns we really need. Men, yes, but without the guns…"

"Why hasn't he pulled the guns from the east division of Central, as requested?"

"Well, sir, he's—not so ready to defer to us, even with your and Ed's reputations. He didn't stop the generals, but he doesn't seem to like the idea of letting you go at things on your own…"

"What does that mean for us?" Hawkeye asked. "We've got some of the weaponry, but…"

A slow, pained exhale. "We'll be working twice as hard on the ground. It'll be tough keeping it on the plaza if it's really trying to get out."

It wasn't fair.

"Fuck Hakuro," Ed spat vehemently all of a sudden, leaning back on his knees to turn and face the surprised officers. "Is _he _the one who'll be running around getting attacked from all directions? He's sitting on his ass somewhere in headquarters, and he thinks he can call all the shots?"

"That's generally how it works, boss," Breda said, without bite.

"He might at least pretend he's not keeping the heavy weapons to defend himself in case this all goes South," Al remarked with a huff as he paused to wipe sweat from the side of his face.

"Besides, if he was worth anything as a leader, he'd be down here in the rubble with the rest of us, with the rest of his men," Ed grumbled. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Mustang's lips twitch in a faint smirk. "Nobody was talking about you, Mustang," he added, grinning in spite of himself.

"You might not end up being all that useful anyway," Breda murmured, peering up at the storm clouds that had blanketed the sky above.

Mustang sighed heavily. "No one will ever let me forget that," he said calmly, though he fingered his gun as though to ensure that it was still in his holster where he'd left it.

"Shit," Al breathed. Ed looked at his brother, surprised, before following Al's gaze. Emerging slowly from the side of a building was a great, barbed creature covered in sharp grey thorns that drew ragged lines in the bricked walls; from the next street over rolled an even larger being with a wickedly large mouth. "It's brought friends."

The Leviathan itself was nowhere in sight, but the thrum of the artillery had grown louder—it was being pushed closer to the plaza, and it was only a matter of time before it, too, made its presence known.

"Hurry," Ed said, tearing his eyes away from the monsters to resume his painting at a frantic pace. Anyone else might scorn the small details that made the array look beautiful to an outsider, but Ed knew they were necessary—exact lettering that spoke of the purpose of the array or little designs that called for balance and strength and that repeated over and over again like prayers. He lost himself in the work, and for several minutes, there was nothing but the rough scribbles of the paintbrush in his hand and the calculated shapes and lines.

When he next looked up, they were nearly alone in the plaza. The soldiers had migrated toward the Beasts, aiming their guns from strategic angles to force the unwanted creatures back.

The Leviathan, however, was being pressed forward—as much as possible for a creature of such immense size. Ed's breath caught in his throat. He'd only been this close to the Leviathan twice before, and each of them had ended badly for him. If nothing else, he'd come to respect the strength of the looming Beast.

In truth, the creature was almost unassuming at first glance. It was an enormous, nebulous blob of swirling dark purples and blacks. Sprouting from its gelatinous sides were a number of thin tendrils that reached out to clutch the sides of buildings and poles as though to support it—which must have been the case, as it was propped up only by four thin, spindly legs that should not have been able to support its weight (and yet cracked the pavement where it trod).

But beyond this was a deep, enthralling power that radiated from its skin, one that sucked Ed's eyes toward the dark being. The air near the creature crackled with sparks and, higher in the clouds above, lightning.

It was enough to make Ed's hair stand on end, and he clearly wasn't alone. Most of the soldiers were giving the Leviathan a wide berth, having been warned, no doubt, of the dangers of coming into contact with it. Others were standing still, wide eyes focused on the creature, whose dark colors swirled bewitchingly inside the soft gel of its skin.

Ed felt himself drawn to the Beast in the same way. He stood, letting the brush drop from his limp fingers, the booms of the heavy artillery ringing in his ears.

It was time to begin.

He sprang forward, a burst of energy springing from God only knew where, but paused when he heard his name shouted at his back. Turning, he found his brother pinning him under the gaze of bright hazel eyes.

"Brother," Al said firmly, "if you die—if you leave me again—" he broke off, unable to finish. Maybe there were no words for what might happen.

Ed nodded somberly. "You too," he said simply. He turned around, his feet carrying him toward the feeling of power, of energy. As he threaded his way through the officers at the edge of the plaza, he began to feel the first drops of rain strike him on the back. The Leviathan was getting nearer now, and Ed had to reach the top of the administration building.

He spun around automatically when he saw a familiar face to one side. The eye patch made it difficult to make out Mustang's expression as he shouted orders to a group of soldiers, but Ed could imagine the determined, almost arrogant firmness of his features.

"Mustang!" he shouted suddenly, stopping in his tracks.

His commanding officer looked surprised. "Fullmetal?"

Ed hardly paused for breath. "If anything happens to Al, I'll tear you apart with my bare hands," he warned.

Mustang only gave him an odd smile and nodded.

Ed hesitated before turning on his heel and running off toward the line of buildings. Before he could quite rebuke himself for wasting time on stupid remarks, he came to an abrupt halt, turned once more, and spat out as though it were painful, "Take care of yourself, Mustang."

The man's eyebrow rose, and he nodded again. As Ed ran off, he thought he heard Mustang add something, but it was lost somewhere in the chaos.

.

Waves of electricity, power, _something _rolled over him, making him both tense and energetic. He paced anxiously atop the administrative building, his feet instinctively bringing him closer to the edge until he redirected his steps. The rain had soaked him to the bone, and the storm had made the skies impossibly dark, but the heavy, booming gunfire filled the air with the smell of gunpowder and illuminated the area in bursts of bright light, allowing Ed to see the scene below.

The Beast had gotten closer, its power sparking in the air around him as the soldiers darted around like insects at its feet, avoiding its touch while pumping it full of lead. Tendrils reached out to support the Beast, slowly eating away at whatever they came into contact with an acidic burn. A steady barrage of bullets forced the creature toward where Ed now stood—which was simultaneously what he wanted and what terrified him—until it was stumbling halfway onto the plaza.

Below, a small figure bent over the array in the middle of the plaza, painting steadily without looking up. Ed clenched and unclenched his fists in rhythm.

It was a long way down, and there was really only one shot at this. If by some miracle he missed the Beast and survived, they might not get another chance; it might be hard to tell where the Leviathan kept its brain, but it still had one, and it was unlikely to fall for the same trick twice.

Still, he was _really _not looking forward to this. It was closer now, only a few yards from the wall, and the arm-like tendrils stretched out to grip the nearby ledge for support.

As he watched the dance of the soldiers, the guns, and the Beast, Ed realized that most people had probably not been told this part of the plan. The soldiers' target was the array, but even in the darkness, Ed could make out a few questioning faces that peered up at the lone figure on the roof of the building.

And then the beast was nearly close enough to touch; he could tell when it made contact with the stone walls by the acidic stench of something burning and the flickering sound of something like lightning or sparks of electricity. Ed couldn't make out the frantic faces peering up at him, but he knew they were down there.

_Alright, _Ed thought to himself, _time to give them a show. _He leapt into the air before he could give himself any more time to think, and he sank into its skin effortlessly, sliding to a halt a few feet in.

The first thing he registered was intense pain—he couldn't see, couldn't breathe, and the throb of energy was nearly unbearable. It was all he could do not to curl into a ball against the bursts of pain that attacked from all sides. The Leviathan was moving around him; he could feel the nebulous gelatin ooze past his face as the Beast jerked and throbbed, throwing a tantrum against this foreign matter that had invaded it.

It was hard for Ed to focus past his aching body. _I have to stop it,_ he reminded himself, then began chanting, _go for the heart, go for the heart, go for the fucking heart. _The swearing made things easier. His mind cleared enough for him to begin using his automail limbs, which thankfully did not register the pain, to wade through the slippery gel. His lungs hurt—how long had he been in here? Not long enough to panic, he assured himself, for what good it did.

He righted himself, struggling in the direction that he thought must be the center, down and to one side. It grew darker here, the murky violet swirls deepening to become as black as pitch, and he knew he was close by the way the pulses of energy pulsed more frequently, pushed at him as though the Leviathan wanted him out.

He thrust his metal arm around him frantically, searching through the thick gel as his senses began to dim and his lungs caught fire. It was around here; it had to be. He couldn't see it, but...but the Beast was huge, and he could have easily missed it, even though he'd aimed…

It wasn't there. It wasn't. He struggled, more slowly now, reaching out blindly, but there was nothing. He began to think the worst until his knee struck something solid.

He jolted, mostly out of the pain of a shot of pure alchemic energy and partly out of surprise. In the total darkness, he felt around madly for the heart, gritting his teeth at the overwhelming pain. There was no time. Regardless, he gingerly wrapped his arm around the heart, steeling himself for the bursts of energy. As soon as he had a good grip, he began writhing downwards toward the ground. Or in the direction he thought was down.

At the most inappropriate time and as dazed as he was, he foggily remembered stories he'd been told of drowning sailors. Of men were lost so deep in the ocean that they couldn't right themselves. Couldn't think straight. Swam down to their doom with the notion that they were swimming up toward their ship…

Was that true…? Who had told him that…?

It had been too long. He tried to breathe despite himself, but the gel was too thick—he was suffocating. He swore that the thick gel was lighter…but maybe he had judged wrong…his thoughts were as sluggish as his movements…

He clutched the heart more tightly against his side with his automail arm. It sparked with angry power against his skin, eating through his skin, burrowing into his flesh and into his organs until his entire body throbbed with pain. He was being burned, being eaten. He couldn't remember anymore.

There was a fire, except that his flesh hand felt odd, cold. Light.

Something grabbed it and tugged, once, hard.

Suddenly, fresh air invaded his lungs; he gasped for breath, spasming in the pain of the heart beside him. Blurred movement—arms clutched and dragged him, and he blearily made out the dark shape of the massive Leviathan as it groaned and collapsed on top of the ground where he'd just been.

A pounding on his chest, and a rhythmic sound. Was that him? It was. He was coughing, choking on his own breath.

Havoc's face swam into view, his hair plastered to his forehead under the heavy rain.

"Shit, Boss," he breathed, his eyes wide. "That was a hell of a scare."

Ed panted something unintelligible, pushing the heavy heart a few inches from the ground where he sat. "Don't…touch," he managed weakly.

"Got it," Havoc said. "Boss, you're shaking—and your shirt!"

Ed looked down. Where he'd clutched the heart to his side was a hole in the fabric. The edges were black, and beneath it, the skin was read and raw. He took a moment to inspect the heart which pulsed in time with the throbs of pain in his side. It was roughly the length of his hand and deep black, darker than any stone he'd ever seen. As he stared, he began to notice violet swirls that worked their way round it, squirming endlessly in the irregular grooves.

He realized suddenly that it was relatively quiet; the fading sound of gunfire echoed from somewhere behind the buildings across from the plaza, but most of the struggles had ended with the collapse of the Leviathan. The stone was pulsating more wildly now, sending bursts of energy into the air and ground below. As Ed's breath returned to him, he sensed—as he had once been able to in the Gate—that the earth trembled slightly beneath him, minute shakes that would crescendo into an earthquake; the pouring storm clouds were tense with electricity and the promise of lightning; a blaze of fire was waiting to burst forth from the rubble of broken buildings.

Ed turned to find that a few dozen officers were staring at him with wide eyes. They had backed away from the foreign sensation of the energy, save Havoc, who stood resolutely at Ed's side.

"Gotta move," Ed said, grabbing the heart with a grimace and throwing his arm in the air for Havoc to help him up.

"Move?" Havoc parroted, automatically pulling the alchemist to his feet, arms slippery from the rain. He threw an arm across Ed's back when he swayed unsteadily, careful to stay away from the side with the stone.

"Heart's still active," he panted, grateful for the support. "We gotta use it up, or it'll keep on destroying everything. Gotta make the Gate."

They wove carefully around the fallen Beast, avoiding the limp legs and tendrils that stretched out like splatters of dark paint across the pavement. Havoc was careful to keep Ed on his feet, despite the fact that they seemed to want to collapse beneath him. As they rounded the side of the Beast, Ed was met with a welcome sight.

"Brother!" Al cried, leaping up from the ground and racing to Ed's side. A quick once-over showed Ed that no harm had befallen his brother, who looked tired but unhurt. Behind him stood Mustang, Hawkeye, Breda, and a few officers Ed didn't recognize. "You're alright?" Al asked worriedly.

"Fine," Ed huffed, still a bit short of breath. "You finished…?"

Al nodded. "We just need that." His gaze fell to the stone cradled against Ed's side. The same alchemy that had burned Ed's skin under the Leviathan's control now felt like a dose of home. The pulses of energy pained him only vaguely now; he felt instead as he had in the Gate, connected to and surrounded by the warmth of the alchemic energy as though he belonged there.

He realized that he missed the feeling, and that he would be almost sad to see it go.

"Yeah," he said, gruffly. "Let's get started."

With the distant shouts of pain and bursts of gunfire behind them, he and Al looked over the array one last time; a mistake now would be catastrophic. Before he had much chance to study it, a familiar feeling rose in Ed, and he felt a shudder as though through his own body.

"Brace yourselves," he warned quietly. The earthquake came quickly after, just small tremors at first that built slowly toward a throbbing shudder. Al swayed, and Havoc stretched out an arm to support Ed, but Ed felt as though he was in his element now, and this was hardly a distraction.

It wasn't the same for everyone else. "No time for double checking," someone shouted from behind. Ed looked over his shoulder to see Mustang, a firm grimace on his face. Behind him, the buildings shuddered under the pulses of energy.

Ed wordlessly strode forward and placed the heavy stone in the middle of the wide array. He crossed back, silently glancing down at the detailed lines as he felt the energy from the heart recede behind him.

At the edge of the array, he motioned for the officers to back away until it was just him and Al standing there, alone. As it was meant to be. He steeled himself for the next part, trying to push away his fear that this might not be enough, that there would need to be more of a sacrifice—

"Ready?" he asked.

"No," Al smiled.

They clapped their hands and slapped the ground simultaneously. The alchemy shot up Ed's arms at once, flowing through his blood like fire. It was the inside of the Leviathan all over again, but this time, he had enough air to scream as the power rushed through him. He faintly thought he could hear Al doing the same, but he didn't have the strength to focus on that thought.

Dazzling light blinded him for a moment, and he squeezed his eyes shut, steering his mind away from the pain and trying to regulate the alchemy's flow as it read the array and accepted its new purpose. _A gate, _he begged hazily. _The Gate, just like it was. Take the alchemy back, but don't take anything else…_

Hours later—it must have been—the alchemy began to slowly recede, rainwater cooling the burning of his skin. He shook his wet hair from his face and opened his eyes, still not daring to remove his hands from the ground or to collapse in a boneless heap as his shaking body so wanted. Al was breathing heavily next to him. Alive. They were both alive.

Wearily, Ed threw a glance over his shoulder, where Mustang and the others were frozen, staring at the fading array with wide eyes, and behind them a few dozen soldiers wandering confusedly back and forth.

"Is it over?" Mustang asked. "Did it work?"

Ed's throat was hoarse, and he didn't yet trust himself to speak. _Had _it worked? His exhausted mind was processing so slowly, but…he thought so. There was no alchemy. He could feel no alchemy in the vicinity, no power lingering in the earth or sky, waiting impatiently to find freedom. The rainwater was dripping more lightly down his back now, and he could feel no threat of lightning from the clouds.

Yes, he thought it had worked. He meant to nod, but at the small downward tilting of his head, the rest of his body followed it to the ground.

There was a shout of alarm, and then the feeling of hands shaking him, but Ed couldn't cling to his consciousness any longer, even at the sight of Al's worried face somewhere above him.

.

.

.

**A/N: **Wow. Um. So. I'm so, so, so sincerely sorry that this chapter is so late, and for the late responses to reviews. It's kind of embarrassing that it's been almost a month. These last few weeks have been really insane at school and work, and it's only getting worse as finals roll around. What I wouldn't give right now for a nice, cool glass of summertime!

So after turning in the massive paper worth 75% of my grade two days ago, I finished and edited the hell out of this chapter. But when I finally had time to finish this chapter and log in to post it, I was completely overwhelmed by all of the amazing and kind reviews! Seriously, guys, I'm really touched by all you've said, and I'm so glad you've enjoyed the story so far! We're almost at the end; just the epilogue is left. So hang on tight while I wrap everything up!

Please leave a note to let me know what you thought!

~ket

**Next Chapter: **Epilogue—Crisis Averted and Chick Flick Moments (Which Will Never Be Spoken of Again)


	11. Crisis Averted and Chick Flick Moments

**.: 11 :.**

**Epilogue**

**Crisis Averted and Chick Flick Moments (Which Will Never Be Spoken of Again)**

.

Roy wondered if Edward ever tired of waking up in the hospital. Fullmetal could have at least tried not to make a habit of hospitalization now that he'd suddenly gotten a new purchase on life, but there was apparently no helping it.

There were slight rustles as Ed began to stir, and Roy lowered his newspaper and leaned back in his chair as the alchemist beside him slowly wandered back to the land of the living. The Brigadier-General had taken up his watch earlier that morning, stationing himself between the two Elric brothers half out of out of worry and half because he was dog-tired of paperwork.

Plus, he got to watch in amusement as the Fullmetal Alchemist blearily opened his eyes and tried to figure out where he was. Ed sat up suddenly. "Holy sh—"

"—careful what you say there, Fullmetal. Hospital decorum and all that." Roy raised one brow as Ed jerked his head to see who spoke.

"You," Ed said, breathing heavily as he reeled a bit. "Wonderful. Wait. Is Al—?"

"Fine," Roy said, noting that Ed's eyes flicked to take in the steady rise and fall of his brother's chest. "He woke earlier, the concussion has mostly receded, and other than his exhaustion, he seems to be fine."

"Huh," Ed huffed, flouncing back on the blankets. A few seconds of holding himself up, and he was practically falling back to sleep already. The furrowed look on his brow notified Roy that this wasn't exactly the case.

"Alchemy?" he murmured. "Is everything back to normal?"

Roy wordlessly snapped his fingers, and a small spark leapt forward just above his thumb, not unlike the steady flame of a cigarette lighter. He brought his hand back down and it disappeared. "I'm no expert," he said, "but everything seems to be in working order. I suppose there's no way of knowing unless you visit the Gate for yourself."

Ed snorted. "Not planning on that anytime soon," he said. "Anyway. Better than expected."

"For _you, _maybe. You're the one everyone's been worried about. Selfish brat," he said, but he made sure there was no bite in the words.

"What the hell?"

"You've been out for almost a week. Your brother's been worried sick," Roy added mildly.

"A _week_?"

"You slept like the dead," Roy confirmed instantly. Al shifted in his sleep, and he lowered his voice. "They kept saying you were fine, but…"

"Huh," Ed said again, covering a yawn with his flesh arm. Roy couldn't help but notice that there was little color in his face, and he still looked exhausted.

"How are you feeling?" he asked cautiously.

The question seemed to catch Ed by surprise, and he stared steadily at Roy before answering. "You're here," he said hazily. "Don't you have…I don't know, a country to take over or something? Isn't this where you emerge triumphant from the ruins or something?"

Roy's mouth twisted, though he wasn't sure whether he meant it to be a grimace or a grin.

No, this wasn't the part where he _emerged triumphant_. Despite all of the hard work, despite his own men putting their lives on the line, there would be no moving up. Not at the moment.

In the end, Hakuro had played his cards too well, clutching his trusted generals protectively around him and allowing no one else in. In the days that had followed the new formation of the Gate, Mustang kept a good eye on the proceedings of the upper echelons of the military and remembered what had gotten Hakuro the position in the first place: he wasn't a great man, but he was a great politician.

Roy had not expected to have this conversation with Ed—everyone else had avoided the topic like the plague—and he was half-surprised at his own bitterness.

"Not quite yet," he said evenly. "Even with the criticism directed at Hakuro right now…well," he shook his head, "it's not the right time."

Ed frowned. "Thought for sure that someone was going to call him out for working _against _us instead of _with _us."

"It takes a lot more than that for a Fuhrer to fall, Fullmetal," Roy said grimly, playing absently with the corner of the newspaper in his lap. "Even one who deserves the position as little as…" he trailed off, realizing the treasonous nature of his own words. In truth, there was no way to openly condemn Hakuro for his actions. The Fuhrer was technically within his rights to protect himself—though it was certainly considered cowardly—and as he had left no trace of his refusal to relinquish the arms and men used to protect himself, there was little to be done.

"But he'll come down, one way or another," Ed said slowly. "And by the time he does, you'll have to be in a position high enough for people to see you as a replacement. To let you step in where he's left off."

Roy inclined his head, feeling the hard expression on his face.

"You'll manage," Ed said suddenly. "Anyone could see that you've got what it takes. You're an _alchemist. _By the people, for the people…" He trailed off, playing with the IV in his arm, probably because Roy was looking at him oddly. After all, was that a vote of confidence from _Edward Elric, _of all people…? "_Any_way_,_" Ed said, changing the subject, "I guess I have to thank you."

"Thank me?" Roy echoed blankly, still catching up.

"Yeah. For watching Al's back."

Their eyes both fell on the occupant of the other bed. Al had somehow managed to move down toward the foot of the bed in his sleep, and his head rested on the mattress instead of the pillow, his limbs pulled in close.

"It was nothing," Roy said softly.

Ed straightened a little at that, and he fixed his superior with an icy glare. "It was not _nothing,_" he said as Roy turned to him in surprise at the vehemence in his voice. "I don't just leave Al with people—not when I know he's in danger. It may have been nothing to you, Bastard Colonel, but not to me."

Roy was speechless for a moment. Then, faintly: "It's Brigadier-General."

"Yeah, yeah," Ed said tiredly. "That's too much of a mouthful."

Roy rolled his good eye at that. "You know I wouldn't have let anything happen to him."

"Yeah," Ed mumbled. "I know. 'S true you're a bastard, but you're a trustworthy one…so if you say you're gonna do something, you will. I think with anyone else…I wouldn't have left Al." He blinked drowsily, sagging against his pillows, until he caught sight of Roy's expression, which must have been one of open surprise. Roy hadn't thought that Edward trusted him with _anything_. Not really. Even leaving Al behind had seemed like a last resort…

"You're being awfully kind today, Fullmetal," he said carefully.

"I'm totally drugged up," Ed muttered defensively, his words emphasized by the yawn that punctuated the end of his sentence. "You shouldn't take anything I'm saying seriously."

Roy smiled. "Sure, Edward."

"Really. You're still a bastard," Ed added, eyes closing.

"I'll keep that in mind," Roy agreed warmly as Ed drifted off.

.

It was later that evening that Ed was caught off-guard by a phone call at the hospital. That was one good thing about staying somewhere connected to military headquarters, anyway: anything vaguely related to the military became first priority for reconstructions and renovations. Ed was hardly surprised when word came that the largely-undamaged military hospital was now powered by a generator, one strong enough to cater to the needs of the countless Amestrians hurt in the last few weeks.

By chance, Ed was half-asleep when a nurse poked her head in to inform them of a call to this room number to be taken, unfortunately, at the front desk again. Al simply shook his head as Ed struggled to sit up, and the younger Elric rose instead to pad down the hall. He returned just as Ed began to doze off again, and he gave his brother nothing more than a smile and a simple "It's for you." Ed pulled himself tiredly from the warm blankets and made his sluggish way to the circulation desk.

A nurse handed him the phone, and it took him a few seconds after he put it to his ear to figure out exactly who was speaking. Or rather, sobbing.

"Winry?"

"Who else would it be, you idiot?" She said huffily, voice catching. "I just got the news. Word travels really slowly with all the damaged roads and power lines." She sniffled. "Geez, you're always making me cry…"

"Sorry," Ed said automatically, and afterwards he opened and closed his mouth without really knowing what to say. He might have been a self-proclaimed genius, but there was nothing that could shut his thoughts off faster than a crying girl. He could almost hear Al snickering from where he stood, and although he knew that his brother wouldn't have followed him, he couldn't help but glance over his shoulder down the hallway to be sure.

Winry who finally spoke again, in a very quiet voice. "You're really back?"

Ed smiled. "Yeah. I'm really back."

After a moment, he heard a swift inhale, which was his only warning as Winry began to shout, "Well, _why the hell couldn't you pick up a phone to tell_ _me? _I had to hear it from Hawkeye this morning! It's been _days!_"

Images of wrenches started swirling around in Ed's mind, but before he could figure out how to deal with her sudden mood swing, she cut him off.

"No—don't answer that. You guys were _too busy_, like you always are. I guess I really shouldn't be surprised."

Ed swallowed back his guilt. He hadn't spared his friend more than a moment's thought since he'd escaped the Gate—but not because he didn't care. It was hard to think of a normal life, of Winry and the rolling hills of his hometown, when the world seemed to be crashing down around him and all of it was in danger anyway. Try telling Winry that, though. It was hard to say something like that without sounding like an asshole, no matter how Ed worded it. But he tried anyway, for the thousandth time, using the same argument he always did: "Winry, it's not like we _meant _not to call you. Things just…there was too much going on all at once."

She sighed over the phone. "There's always too much going on at once with you, Ed."

He shifted uncomfortably, but as always, his discomfort somehow masked itself with anger. "What was I supposed to do? Tell the Beasts to 'hold on for a sec, I just gotta make a quick phone call?'" he bit out.

"I'm sure you could have managed _that _at least. You're a smart kid, Ed."

The sarcasm only made things worse. "_Winry_—" he began.

"Save it, Ed," Winry cut him off, sighing. "I didn't call to yell at you. Or I didn't mean to, anyway. I just wanted to see how you were doing."

Ed deflated, thrown off. "How I'm doing?"

"Well, _you_ didn't call _me. _So you can make up for it by telling me what happened, for starters."

"What do you—you mean with the Beasts?"

"No. Yes. Tell me everything. The last time I heard news about you, it was that you were dead. Well, maybe Al didn't say it like _that. _But the Gate took you or something. So what happened? I might not have been there, but I still want to know, and it's good for you to talk about it."

"It's good for _me_, huh?"

"Of course. You listen to me griping all the time, so you finally get a turn, too. You know it makes you feel better." Ed could hear her smile over the phone. "So talk."

"Sure thing, Win," he said sarcastically, but his lips began to twitch back up. "Well…where do I start?"

"The beginning. You can start by telling me how you obviously _didn't _die."

Ed couldn't keep back a chuckle. "I wouldn't say that, exactly. But I guess it's more complicated than you'd think…"

He began to speak, haltingly at first, of his sacrifice at the Gate, of the creatures inside of it, and of what happened to him in between leaving and returning to Amestris. Winry asked more questions than anyone else had, but not in a nosy or annoying way. Somehow, she managed to pull details from Ed that he hadn't thought to explain, as though she needed to really understand _everything _in order to make up for all the time that he'd spent shouldering the burden alone without her. Maybe Ed should have found it an intrusion of privacy—and with anyone else, he might have—but the words flowed out of him so easily that he didn't have a moment to think about it.

Winry interrupted him partway through his description of Mustang's and Hawkeye's flabbergasted expressions upon first finding him in Aquaroya. "You idiot," she said affectionately, still laughing. "Alright," she began, once her giggles had finally settled down. "Alright, my time's up."

"Time?" Ed fumbled.

"Yeah. The power went out day before last, and they're only allowing ten minutes at the station phone booths, since everyone's trying to make calls. Actually, I think I took more time than that," she added, "but no one was around until a minute ago."

Ed realized that he'd heard nothing at all about how Risembool had fared. "Are you guys okay out there?"

"We're fine," she said. "We heard much worse on the radio than what we saw in person, and there weren't any major disasters or anything like that. It's mostly that some of the roads aren't passable, so I can't get to Central. But I'll see you soon, when we can…"

"'Course," he said. "As soon as things are patched up."

"Look, Ed…" her voice caught. "When you were gone…" There was a voice in the background, and Winry said something in response. "…and my time's really up. I guess…"

"Don't worry. I'll see you soon," Ed said determinedly.

"Yeah. See you." He moved to put the phone down, but she said something he couldn't hear. He quickly raised it back to his ear.

"Winry?" Ed could hear shuffling in the background.

"Sorry, it's just…I'm _really_ glad you're back. Things were so different when you were gone. Empty, I guess. And I missed you. A lot. We should—um…anyway, I have to—"

There was a click, and Ed slowly placed the phone into the receiver and stood there quietly for a few moments, his cheeks warming for some strange reason, until odd looks from the staff pushed him back toward the room. He thought he had waited long enough for the red to fade from his face, but Al knew somehow, and he watched his older brother smugly as Ed clambered back into bed.

"I take it the conversation went well?" he asked politely.

"Shut it, Al," Ed said without bite.

That made for two conversations that week that he thought he would likely never speak of again. _People are funny when you come back from the dead,_ he thought wryly.

.

After almost three more days in the hospital, the Elric brothers were officially discharged from care. This may or may not have been because Edward had finally managed to convince his brother to participate in a wheelchair race outside in the therapy garden, but there was really no telling.

The nurses, who were particularly fond of the brothers, offered to arrange a ride for them. By mutual agreement, the pair turned their offer down. It had been a long time since they had been able to stretch their legs for any extended period of time, and in an atmosphere of relative peace, no less. Better to take advantage of that while they could.

They passed reminders of the crumbling infrastructure as they walked—fallen buildings, cracked streets, overturned vehicles—everywhere with blue-uniformed men and women dashing to and fro like ants rebuilding a colony. Ed hadn't even been aware that there _were _so many officers in the city.

He himself had been expressly ordered to take it easy and _not _to aid in the cleanup (Mustang's exact phrasing was something along the lines of "I've learned to expect property damage over property restoration from you in the past."). Ed wouldn't say it aloud, but that suited him well enough. His energy had been sapped by wrestling his way through the Leviathan and balancing the array for the Gate, and he was just as happy to spend a few more aimless days resting with his brother. He'd put up a good fight for show, of course, but he was no longer so certain that Mustang couldn't see through that sort of thing.

"How's your leg?" Al inquired suddenly, drawing him from his thoughts. Ed had not even realized that he'd been rubbing absently at the place where flesh and automail met, and he stopped instantly, as though chastised.

"It's alright," he responded automatically, but Al shot him such a hard look—one that was every bit as steely as the armor that had once housed his soul—that Ed relented. "It's getting colder, Al," he said, "and automail always gets like this in the winter."

"Ah. Seasonal aches and pains. I'd almost forgotten," Al said quietly. "Maybe you can have Winry take a look at it whenever we see her next." There was no hint of teasing in his brother's voice when he mentioned their mutual friend, but Ed still got the feeling that Al was amused.

"Yeah, maybe," he replied offhandedly.

A few seconds later, in a smaller voice, Al asked, "Does it bother you?"

Ed understood that Al wasn't talking only about the aches and pains anymore. "Not even a little."

His younger brother hesitated. "But…maybe we could—"

"No," Ed said firmly. "We're done with the Gate, Al." He took in the morose look on his little brother's face and huffed. "Don't you think we've messed with it enough? We've thrown ourselves too many times."

"That's not what we used to say, Brother," Al argued. "It was always, 'we won't stop until we get our bodies back.' _Both _of our bodies. We _promised. _And for you to live like this, still hurting, still…well, I can't stand that! Can you?"

"This doesn't matter to me, Al," he said earnestly, gesturing vaguely to his right arm. "I don't care that I'm like this, so stop worrying. All that matters now is that we're together, and you're back. That's all I've ever needed."

Al drew back. "So that's what's changed, then?" he asked icily. "That's why you're not all for figuring this out? It's because your real priority this whole time was to fix _me _and to suffer alone?"

"I'm not _suffering, _Al!" Ed said exasperatedly, rolling his eyes. "And that's not what I meant. I _thought _we might both get our bodies back, but now that it's over, this is all I could ask for."

"It doesn't have to be over, Brother! We could still have everything if we just don't stop, if we just keep walking—"

"I _do _have everything, Al! I have everything I wanted! _This _is what I was after, and I'm not going to throw it all away again by running to the Gate without a plan!"

"Who's to say we wouldn't have a plan? If you would just _listen_—"

"Is everything alright?" a voice interrupted, and both brothers jumped, suddenly aware that their argument had escalated in volume, and that they'd both stopped in the middle of the road, fists clenched. A few officers regarded them warily from where they were moving debris from the street.

"Everything's fine, sir," Al said, deflating, at the same time that Ed snapped, "None of your business."

"Well," said the man, eyes flickering from one brother to the next, "see that you move whatever this is along. We don't need fights breaking out in the streets on top of everything else."

Al nodded curtly, and they walked on. "We're _fine,_" Ed growled over his shoulder at the eyes at their backs.

There was a moment of silence as both brothers moved through the small crowd of officers while trying to look as harmless as possible.

"How did you think I'd feel, anyway?" Al hissed once they were out of earshot. "Once I was back to normal and you weren't? Didn't you think I'd be upset?"

"I thought you'd be _whole. _Happy. The rest didn't matter."

They were approaching the dorms now, and Al looked as weary as Ed felt. "I am," Al said. "I'd just have been happier if you'd let me in on everything too."

"Couldn't have done that," Ed said with a smile. "I'm the older brother. I'm supposed to take care of you."

Al wasn't smiling, and as they took the side stairs, he began to frown determinedly. "You're right about the Gate, I suppose. I don't like it, and I'll probably keep looking even if you won't." He shrugged. "Maybe there's nothing we can do. But Ed," he added, "you have to promise me something."

"What?" Ed asked warily.

"Promise that this is the last of the over-protectiveness. That you'll stop sacrificing yourself for me—for anyone. Last time, things didn't go too well."

"I got back, didn't I?" Ed asked flippantly.

"_Brother,_" Al grumbled, looking his brother straight in the eye. "Seriously. No more. Because I can't go through that again."

Taken aback, Ed sobered. "I know. I can't either…and I shouldn't have…well. Alright, Al."

In the years of living with Ed as a brother, Al had learned to take whatever he could get. He nodded, looking a little more pleased.

Finally, they stood in their simple dorm room, late afternoon light streaming in through the window and the dusty warmth hemming them in from all sides. Ed dropped his coat on the back of one of the kitchen chairs, and Al leaned back against the bedroom door, looking idly about the room.

"So." Ed said suddenly.

"So." Al rejoined after a moment.

Ed frowned.

"So. No news from the Bastard Colonel, no stones or books to chase after, nowhere to be…I mean. We're really…we can…"

Whatever they were and whatever they could do, Ed couldn't quite figure it out.

"I guess," Al began unsurely, "I guess it might be pretty quiet for us from now on. Since we're done with…everything."

Ed snorted, because there was one thing he was sure of. "Quiet? Hell, no. Where's the fun in that?"

Al smiled.

.

"Alright, then. What will it be?"

The following day, Ed sat in a chair facing Mustang in the office at headquarters, having wandered there at his leisure with Al after assuming (and rightly so) that the next leg of the Gate crisis would involve bureaucracy and mounds of paperwork, neither of which he particularly wanted to take part in.

Ed wasn't sure what he'd expected to happen upon their arrival. The brothers were both warmly welcomed by all of Mustang's staff, who had been given only general updates about their recovery. There were small signs—Breda's almost pained look as he clapped Al on the shoulder, a suspicious shine to Fuery's eyes, and a quiet "Glad you're back, boys" from Hawkeye—that showed their mixture of worry and relief. After Havoc had ruffled Ed's hair for the third time (with a smirk that said he _knew _Ed hated that), he was ushered alone into Mustang's office, where he now sat and listened to his brother laughing at something just outside the closed door at his back.

He fidgeted, tapping the heel of one boot restlessly. "No repercussions for walking away?" He asked.

"None," Mustang said firmly, folding his arms across his chest. "Your contract expired about two months ago, and even without that, no one would blame you if you needed a break after what you've done. If that's what you want."

There were those words again. _If that's what you want._ Mustang had said them earlier, and Ed was suddenly having a hard time wrapping his head around them.

He didn't have to be here anymore. He didn't have be anywhere. He didn't have to do anything. So what _did_ he want?

The last thing Ed had expected was to be given the opportunity to worm out of his contract early. After all, he'd technically not given his full term of service, as he'd spent the past year inside of the Gate. Plus, the government was notoriously stubborn about upholding contracts, and it was rare for a State Alchemist to be given the chance to worm out of military grasp before the deadline.

Ed might not have believed it at all, except that Mustang had pushed forward a piece of paper and a pen. They lay there at the edge of the desk. There was even a blank line where his signature would go.

He'd spent so long wishing to get out of the military's clutches that he couldn't believe that he was hesitating now.

Mustang leaned back in the chair with a casual nonchalance, one eye trained lazily on his subordinate as though Ed's choice didn't matter to him at all. _Hell, _Ed thought, _maybe it doesn't. But it matters to me._

Ed had been mulling over his attitude toward his commanding officer ever since that conversation they'd had in the hospital, the one that would absolutely never be brought up again. At any rate, he was still convinced that the vast majority of the military was composed of a bunch of second-rate stiffs with their thumbs up their asses, but it didn't necessarily include Mustang. Or least not all the time, anyway.

What was more, Ed _owed _Mustang. Maybe not enough to renew his contract when it came up again—that might be getting too carried away—but enough to see through what they'd started together, at the very least. Mustang had been watching the Elrics' backs for years, and in the past few days more than ever. Ed couldn't walk out on him now, he realized, no matter how good the opportunity. Not until he'd returned the favor.

"No," he said shortly, shaking his head. "I'll stay."

Mustang was surprised, but Ed only knew because he'd learned how to tell. A minute raise of the eyebrow and a slight twist to the mouth.

It was worth staying for a while longer just to keep the old bastard on his toes, anyway.

"You're staying," Mustang said slowly. "Even after all your complaining about being forced to be a dog of the military?"

"I guess around here military dogs aren't treated as badly as everywhere else." Ed supposed he could give him that much.

Mustang hummed and pulled the paper and pen away slowly. "And you're sure? I have the feeling I won't be able to offer you another chance."

"I'm sure. Me and Al—we're finished. We got what we wanted. But you're still aiming." He fixed Mustang with a pitying look. "Besides, if you're trying to get higher up than you are, you'll need all the help you can get."

"Is that so?" Mustang asked with a smile.

"You bet. Besides," he added, mind spinning, "we'll need a steady income again now that there's two of us, and our savings are starting to dip kinda low. Oh. And I owe someone a boat," he remembered, ignoring the steady climb of Mustang's eyebrow.

"Well," Mustang added eventually, "that will be easier to work out on a Lieutenant Colonel's salary."

"Lieutenant Colonel?"

"A posthumous promotion, remember," Mustang said easily. "It would be…unbecoming of them to take it away just because the recipient came back from the dead."

Ed snorted. "Right. I'm not even surprised. Anyway, things would be boring if I didn't stick around now." He didn't bother to clarify whether that would be on his end or the officers'.

Mustang fixed him with a calculating stare and nodded. "Alright, then," his commanding officer—still—said briskly. "We're done here. I'll make arrangements. I suppose this just means you'll continue to be a pain in the ass around here."

"What, seriously?" Ed exclaimed, rolling his eyes.

"Seriously," Mustang agreed, rising to his feet with a wry smile. "You wouldn't believe the paperwork involved in legally bringing someone back from the dead."

Ed let out a surprised bark of laughter. "It probably serves you right. For something." He stood to go, calling a short goodbye over his shoulder as he wandered back into the room where Al and the others waited. He hadn't saluted or waited to be dismissed, of course, but he thought that Mustang might have died of shock had he done either, promotion or not.

.

"You're staying, of course," Al said, as soon as Ed had told him about Mustang's offer during their walk back to the dorms. Ed would never understand how Al could possibly infer Ed's choices in less time than it took Ed to make them.

"Well, things might be boring otherwise," Ed offered, but Al shot him a knowing glance.

"I'm sure that wasn't the only reason, Brother," he murmured.

"It wasn't," Ed agreed easily, but he wasn't going to go into it past that. "It's just _my_ contract, though, Al. You don't have to stick around if you don't want to."

Al hummed. "Things might be boring otherwise."

Ed smiled as they fell into a companionable silence. Miraculously, in Ed's opinion, many of the businesses along this stretch of road were struggling to reopen, and the brothers had even snared some excellent Xingese food from a vendor who had set up a makeshift outdoor kitchen of her half-fallen restaurant. Al looked on in amusement as his brother munched happily on one of the kebobs.

"Eventually, though," he began with a mouthful of food, "it might be nice to do something on our own. Being a consultant to the military doesn't sound so bad," he said voicing an idea he'd been toying with. "And it means that I wouldn't have to fill out any more reports for that bastard."

"Brother," Al laughed, half in exasperation, "didn't you just agree to stick with him?"

"Not forever, Al," Ed countered. "There's more I want to do than that. It's the same for you, isn't it?"

Al paused. "Well…okay, one day, I thought it might be nice if we opened a business. For alchemy, I mean," he clarified, as Ed shot him a confused look. "It might be sort of the same as being a consultant, but it would mean we could help everyone, not just the military. Everyone needs things fixed or needs help understanding alchemy sometimes."

Ed nodded fervently. "Yeah, that's true! Except if we did it together, you might have to deal with the people who need help understanding alchemy. I'd just rip people's heads off if they didn't get something."

Al laughed. "You're not that bad a tutor, Brother. You help me all the time."

"But that's _you_, so it's different. Besides, it goes both ways."

"We wouldn't be able to do as much research, though," Al cautioned. "We'd lose the whole library…"

"I'll see if I can work it out," Ed said decidedly, already figuring out if it was possible to blackmail Mustang into such a thing.

"Or we could wander around a bit. I hear that the library in the capital of Aerugo is supposed to be huge. Maybe we should spend some time there…but that's a lot. What are we going to do first?"

Ed knew the answer to that. He tossed the kebob wrapper and slung an arm around his brother's shoulders.

"Anything we want," he laughed. "The world's wide open."

fin

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**A/N: **Holy crap, the fluff just oozed out of everywhere. I didn't mean for that much sap, honest, but the story didn't want to finish anywhere else. In other news, OH MY GOD I finished a story! I can hardly believe it's really over! :') I rarely take on much more than a one-shot or a short series of one-shots. So when I began this, it seemed like a massive undertaking, but I'm actually fairly pleased at how it turned out!

At present, though, there are no plans for a sequel...I'll never say never because I _do _like to toy with the idea of finding out where Ed and Al might venture once they realize that they're free of obligations, and whether Mustang ever makes it to the top like he wants to. HOWEVER, whether or not I write a sequel, I will probably (eventually) update my FMA one-shot, Otherwise, which takes place in this same universe, to reflect events that happen after the ending of this story. So keep an eye out for it!

Thanks a _ton _to everyone who has stuck around to read the whole story, and even more to those who took a second to review. There's nothing that motivates me like a good review, even if it's just a couple of words. If you have the time, please let me know what you thought of the story – it always helps, and it always makes my day!

Until next time,

ket


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